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I 



TWELVE LECTURES 



THE TEACHIiN'O OF THE BIBLE 



IN EELATION TO 



THE FAITHS OF CHRISTENDOM; 



TO WHICH AEE ADDED 



FIVE ADDITIONAL LECTURES, 

On The Devil, Judgment to Come, The Promises to tee Fathess. 
The Covenant with David, and The Signs of the Times. 



FIFTH EDITION. O^'^i 



n 



BY ROBEET ROBERTS, 



OF BIRMINGHAM. 



BIRMINGHAM : 
published by the author, athen^um rooms, temple row, 

OF WHOM copies OF THIS AND THE WORKS ADVERTISED 
on PAGES 371 & 372, MAY BE HAD. 

18 6 9. 






U^^' 



■^0-p 



PEEFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. 



The following lectures were delivered in Ilnddersfield during the past winter , 
and many persons having requested them to be put in their present pernianeDt 
form, they are now given to the public in the same spirit in which they were 
delivered, viz., from a desire to promote the personal /study of the Holy 
Scriptures, with a view to salvation. The author, however, cannot allow them 
to get into the hands of the reader, without acknowledging his indebtedness to 
John Thomas, M.D., formerly of England, now of New York, by whose writings 
he was directed to the study of the Bible, and through whose able and original 
expositions he was enabled, in a short time, to comprehend its teachings, as contra- 
distinguished from ordinary theology. He feels himself bound to give this 
testimony as a merited tribute of gratitude, which he is glad of this opportunfty of 
being able publicly to render. He now commits the lectures to the public, in the 
hope that they will stir up the earnest among the people to examine anew the 
foundations of their faith. 

HuDDERSPiELD, VltJi February^ 1862. 



PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. 



These lectures have now been before the public for eighteen months. An 
edition of a thousand was, in the first instance, entirely disposed of with little or no 
assistance from public sale ; and, the demand continuing, a second edition is 
issued, in the hope that they will attain a still more extensive circulation among 
that class of persons who are interested in the topics discussed, and, in fact, 
devoutly concerned for their own salvation. It was for this class they weie 
written, that they might be delivered from the grievous incubus of popular error 
on the subject of religion, and introduced to the sublime and saving doctrines of 
Christianity, as comprehensively based on the writings of Moses, the prophets, and 
the apostles. The accomplishment of this object is all the compensation the author 
seeks for his labour, and he is gratified to know that it has been attained in several 
instances, since the issue of the first edition. 

In the present edition, the lectures have been extensively revised, and in some 
instances, remodelled ; and an appendix has been added for the consideration of 
certain interesting and important subjects, only alluded to in the lectures. A 
copious index to the whole has also been supplied, as well as a list of persons in 
difterent parts of the kingdom who may be corresponded with in reforoneo to 
the doctrines sot forth. With these amendments, the author hopes the book, as a 
whole, may be found more interesting and useful than in its original form. 



He cannot allow this edition to c:,o forth without explaining that its publication 
*s entirely due to the munificence of a friend of the truth (Captain D. Brown, of 
India) who spontnneously placed the necessary means at his disposal, and 
boldly undertook the responi^ibility of the enterprise. This has enabled him to 
offer it at a price which would otherwise have been impracticable in an edition so 
limited. 

With these prefatoiy remnrks, the lectures are again committed to the public, 
in the hope that they will be read impartially, and judged with reference to the 
standard to which exclusively they profess to be amenable— the Word of God* 
If this is done, the author feels confident that educational bias itself will give 
way before conviction wrought by evidence and argument honestly and logically 
presented. 

HuDDEKSFiELD, Kt'vcmhcr 6tlt, 1SG3. 



PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION. 



The issue of a third edition of this work has been necessitated by the continuance 
of a demand which, after swallowing up the last edition of a thousand copies, has 
reached a prospective aggregate order for upwards of 600 more. This demand, as 
in the previous instance, has arisen independently of public advertisement, and 
cannot but be regarded as a symptom of increasing disposition to examine religious 
subjects independently of a stereotyped and all-powerful orthodoxy, which holds 
the generality of minds in hopeless intellectual bondage. 

There can be little doubt that the tendency of the age in every department of 
thought, is in the direction of independence, but, unfortunately, in the religious 
department, this independence is being turned to bad account. Thinkers are 
degenerating into a kind of Deism, which is fatal to the claims of Christianity, 
while the sober-minded and devout are lost on the polemical labyrinths of the 
time, or driven to the extremity of shutting their eyes against every form of 
investigation, and committing themselves with fatuitous resignation to a faith that 
will not stand the most ordinary exercise of reason, and which presents quite as 
many jagged discomforts as spiritual consolations. This result is to be attributed 
to the perverted form in which Bible doctrines are presented by the accredited 
religious teachers of past and present times. 

The Bible is no more responsible for the orthodoxy of Christendom than for 
Mormonism. This it is the object of the following lectures to prove. The Bible 
propounds a system of doctrine which is compatible with all the evidences of sense, 
as systematized in the material sciences of the age, and which at the same time — 
commends itself to the moral instincts of every fully developed mind, as supplying ■ 
those links, in tho absence of which, the human understanding is baffled in its 
attempts to fathom the mysteries of existence. 



The perusal of the following lectures is again invited in proof of this fact, in 
the hope and with the prayer that every earnest mind in whose path they may 
chance to be thrown, may find something like a stable foundation on which to 
build a hope for that future, which, apart from the Word of God, is a profound 
and painful mystery. 

Birmingham, June list, 1865. 



PREFACE TO FOURTH EDITION. 



"Set another edition. The last, consisting of 1,400 copies, was sold in less than 
twelve months, and, as before, without the intervention of the publisher or 
bookseller. The lectures have now been " out of print" for about a year, and a 
continuous demand from all quarters has resulted in the present edition, (2,000 
copies,) which is an improvement on former editions in every respect. The size of 
page is a little larger, the quantity of matter greatly increased, and the 
workmanship superior, while, through the kindness of friends of the truth, the first 
thousand is issued two-fifths under cost price. 

Five new lectures have been added, making the number in all seventeen, 
instead of twelve. The name of the book (Twelve Lectures) is, however, retained 
for the sake of identity, and the additional lectures are interspersed among the 
others according to the requirements of affinity, being distinguished from the 
others by the insertion of the letter A in parenthesis, after the number of the 
Lecture. 

In addition to the writing of five new lectures, the old lectures have been re^ased, 
and in one or two instances, nearly re-written. The old appendix, superseded 
by the new lectures, is abolished, and a new one substituted, consisting of, 1 — a 
review of the objections usually urged against the New Testament doctrine of 
resurrection and judgment; 2 — a summary of the truth shewn side by side (in 
parallel columns) with a summary of orthodoxy — twenty-six paragraphs of each ; 
3 — a chapter on the present ecclesiastical position of the truth's friends, with a 
brief directory for the guidance of the enquiring stranger. 

Under the circumstances, the price of the Lectures (after the first thousand) is 
increased, but the increase is not so great as to interfere with their continued 
circulation, and a still more enlarged and successful accomplishment of the object 
contemplated in their publication, viz., the enlightenment of the good and 
honest-hearted in the great principles of eternal truth revealed in the writings 
of Moses, the prophets, and the apostles, but effectually obscured and nullified and 
destroyed by the religious teaching of the present day, which, while professing to 
be the truth of Christ, is nothing more than ancient fables dressed up in the garb 
of Bible phraseology. 

BlIlMINGHAM, Juhj '30th, 18G7. 



PREFACE TO THE FIFTH EDITION. 



1 



A LITTLE over twelve months having sufficed to exhaust the fourth edition of 2,000 
copies, a fifth edition of this work (after considerable delay,) is now issued. Very- 
little alteration has been made in it. The text of the lectures is substantially 
the same as in the fourth edition ; the only change is a little re-arrangement of 
matter, and a few verbal emendations. 

The answer to the objections urged against the New Testament doctrine of judg- 
ment is withdra^Yn from the appendix, and incorporated with Lecture iv (a), of 
which it forms a natural part. The appendix, thus abridged, is made up of the 
comparative summary of Truth and Error ; a few words to the interested reader ; 
and advertisements of Christadelphian works. 

Some of the lectures (found to be wanting in vigour somewhat,) would have 
been re- written had the author's leisure permitted it. The pressure of other occu- 
pations has compelled him to let them re-appear as they are. This might be a 
defect, if literary effect were aimed at; but with the object in view, it is not a 
material drawback. The arguments and conclusions, though capable of being more 
powerfully elaborated, are in themselves unassailable ; and therefore adapted, in 
spite of feeble sentences, to secui^e the result desired— the conviction of honest minds 
of the fallacy of orthodox religion, and ("f the scriptm^alness of the opposing views 
herein presented. 

This edition differs from predecessors in being published in cloth binding, (and 
some copies in leather,) instead of stitched pamphlet form ; causing, of course, an 
increase in price, but giving the advantage of greater durability. It also differs 
from them in this respect, that being stereotjT)ed, this edition is without limit as to 
number. It is proposed to print 4,000 copies to start with, and when these are sold, a 
fresh supply will be forthcoming without fui^ther delay. The lectures will not 
again be out of supply. 

The prophetico -chronological conclusions of Lectui^e xi (a), are allowed to 
appear unaltered, although the state of facts in this year, 1869, would seem to 
stultify them. The fact is that events have verified them, and brought us to the 
era of the advent. A.D. 1866 has been signalised by epochal events characteristic 
of the termination of the Little Horn period, though it has not brought the consum- 
mation. The mistake was in expecting the occurrence of the advent and resurrection 
immediately 1866 was attained. This was a natural mistake, in view of the fact 
that the period terminating at that date, was prophetically determined to elapse 
before these events could occur. It was not seen that their occurrence immediately on 
the termination of the period, was not a prophetic necessity. The analogy of 
former dispensations shows that it was not. 

The expiry of former periods has not been marked by the predestined sequel at 
once, in a mature form, but by a new phase of events leading in the 2^redicted direc- 
tion. Israel left Egypt thirty yeai's after the expiry of the period specified in the 



word to Abraham — iOO years; the restoration of Israel from Babylon was not accom- 
plished for seventy years after the period (70) fixed as the duration of their 
captivity ; but in both cases events tending to the development of the foretold results 
signalised the exact ending of the period. In the former case, Moses, who was fifty 
years of age at the end of the 400, had appeared on the scene, and " supposed his 
brethren would have understood how that God, by his hand, would deliver them." 
— (Acts vii. 25.) In the latter, Nebuchadnezzar's dynasty was overthrown by 
Darius, who belonged to a people favourable to Israel. 

In the present case, all we need look for in this respect is transpiring before our 
eyes. The events prophetically characteristic of the termination of the '•' times of 
the Gentiles," are the facts of contemporary history. Papal ascendancy is at an 
• end in the world of politics, secular and ecclesiastical. It came to an end in 1866, 
with the blow which levelled Austrian domination in Germany. The Prussian 
sword cut the Concordat, and, in the discomfiture of Austria, smote to the ground 
the prop which for over a thousand years has maintained the temporal supremacy 
of the court of Pome. This is an eloquent sign of the times, which derives addi- 
tional significance from the concurrent downfal of church establishments in Italy, 
Spain and England, and the uprise and prosperity of the truth. 

But of the exact date of the Lord's appearing, we have no definite information. 
"We are without mistake i^:i. the era of that wonderful event, and it may be the 
occurrence of any day ; but " of that day and hour knoweth no man." "We are in 
the position the disciples occupied in relation to the day of God's judgment on 
Jerusalem : we wait in a state of indefinite expectancy, knowing that the event 
looked for is near, even at the door ; but not knowing exactly how long. 

The truth developed in a complete form is rapidly creating a people for the name 
of the Lord at his return. Such a work is a necessary prelude to the advent, though 
to what extent it must go, we know not. The apostolic testimony gives us to 
understand that Jesus finds a people alive at his coming. Hence, their develop- 
ment is a necessity of the end. It is meet that Christ should have a people 
contemporary with the developments of the end. It were an unhappy situation 
that on his return, he should have no friends among the living, but must look to 
the grave for them, and those unacquainted with the generation upon which he 
will have to operate. A loving, zealous people, familiar with the historical situa- 
tion, and with the institutions and customs of the age, may not be without their 
especial function in the day when Christ makes use of his household, in the subju- 
gation and instruction of the nations of the earth. 

At his coming in the flesh, John the Baptist, by preaching, gathered from Israel 
a select people, to whom in due course Christ was manifested by the descent of the 
Holy Spirit, and by means of whom in their ultimate operations, he proclaimed the 
way of life to the world, vanquished Paganism, and enthroned his name tradition- 
ally in the high places of the earth. His coming in the spirit draws near ; a people 
is in preparation, increasing in numbers, faith, zeal and service, to whom, when 
their development has reached a certain point, he will be revealed, with the thoua- 



I 



8 

Rnds whom he shall bring from the dead by his power, and by means of whose 
recruited forces he will enter into conflict with the world, drive Gentile power from 
every throne, and establish his kingdom under the whole heaven. The truth's 
operations will then be transferred from the arena of debate to that of military 
coercion. The power of Christ and hi«5 brethren will be- established triumphantly 
in every kingdom, country and city in the globe. How long we may have to wait 
before things assume this phase, it is impossible to tell. 

It is ours to work while it is still " called to-day," knowing that it will be too ■ 
late to work when "the Master of the House rises up, and the door is shut ; " and I 
working, it is wisdom alone to work on the principle expressed in the words 
•'whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might." On this principle, 
though believing the world to be on the very verge of the second advent, 
we issue this fifth edition of the Lectures, in the hope that, before the day of salva- 
tion is at an end, himdreds more may be assistei to enter the narrow way 
that leadeth unto life. 

The Author. 

BiRMiXGHAM July lOt-'i, 1869. 



f 



CONTENTS. 



Prefaces ^ . . - . . , . Page 3. 

LECTURE I. 

The Bible — What it is mid How to Interpret it. 

Introductory — " Lay " preacliing vindicated — " Holy Orders '' an ecclesiastical invention 
' — the Bible a divine production — its literary structure — its essential character — 
its wonderful features — a literary miracle — the evidences of its genuineness — 
incredibility of imposture — unbelief— its disadvantages— extremes of infidel advocates 
—modern rationalism — its origin in the absurdities of popular religion— an objection 
anticipated — the dark ages — the Eeformation — its partiality — the clerical system — 
popular neglect of religion — difiS.culties of the thoughtful — the end of their doubts- 
spread of infidelity— the remedy — the language of the Bible— its plainness — spiritualistic 
interpretation illustrated — its claims exploded — the Bible allowed to interpret itself — 
literalism, metaphor, and symbol — claims of the Old Testament — a popular error 
refuted — importance of the Old Testament shewn from the New— an appeal to the 
reader. Page 13. 

LECTURE IL 

Human Nature essentially mortal, as proved hy Nature and Revelation, 

An apology to the reader— popular theory of the human constitution — immortal- 
soulism — the contrary affirmed — course of argument indicated — natural evidence in 
favour of the popular theory examined— the attributes of matter — nature of reason — 
mental itinerancy — dreaming— consciousness of disseveredlimbs— continuous identity 
— natural arguments on the other side— location of the mind — the brain — mental de- 
pression—physical debility — cranial injuries— infantile inanity— diversity of disposi- 
tion and capacity — compound nature of man — mystery no bar to belief — functional 
manifestation — a lame attempt to get out of a difificulty — the true wisdom — the voice of 
the Holy Oracles — silence on immortal-soulism — difi'erent interpretations thereof — 
" Soul : ■' its significance in Scripture use — illustrations— Scripture testimony to the 
vanity of human nature — the creation of man — " dust and ashes " — coincident sentiment 
of Scripture — tendency of immortal-soulism— personal duty. Page 23. 

LECTURE III. 

The Head TJnconscious till the Resurrection, and consequent error of popular 
belief in Heaven and Hell, 

Death — its effect on survivors — an inconsistency — nature of death — deprivation of 
existence — scriptural records of death — state of the dead as depicted in the Scriptures — 
a contrast — resurrection a necessity— modern sentiment versus Scripture teaching — 
nature of the testimony — Supposed New Testament Proof of the Popular Doctrine, 



10 



lat no w ! 



viz., The thief on the cross— the rich man and Lazarus— the great multitude tnat 
man can number, seen by John the Revelator — Stephen's dying prayer— " Absent from 
the body "— " Desire to depart and be with Christ "—Christ's sacrifice— no peace for the 
wicked— Moses and Elias on the Mount of Transfiguration— God is not the God of the 
dead— the angels of believers— man unable to kill the soul— Heaven— popular theory- 
apparent scriptural sanction— its true significance — "No man hath ascended into 
heaven "—the true hope of the dead— New Testament consolation for the living— salva- 
tion to be manifested on the earth-Hell— horrible picture— the hell of the Bible— 
•the belief of Pagans — people opening their eyes — destiny of the wicked, annihilation. 

Page 45. 
LECTURE IV. 

Immortality a conditional gift, to be Bestowed at the Eestir7'ection. 
The question for consideration — dread of death — desire for immortality — Plato's argu- 
ment — philosophy in its right place — Unbelief and Orthodoxy equally at fault — mortality 
considered — nature of life — popular error — mystery of human condition — the explana- 
tion — Adam and Eve — the test — the failure — the consequence — origin of death — the 
foolish sneer — the wisdom of the devout — exclusion from the Tree of Life — the inference 
— future life a Bible revelation — Mission of Christ — " The Resurrection and the Life " — 
New Testament proofs — nature of Immortality — incorruptibility — the resurrected 
body — time of bestowrhent — Spiritual body substantial — proof — Christ's post-resurrec- 
tional interview with his disciples — the disease of haman nature — Christ the great 
Physician — state of the righteous in future glory — salvation conditional — Universalism 
a heresy — the lost — various classes and destinies — no hell torments. Page 76. 

LECTURE IV (a). 

Judgment to Come : the Dispensation of Divine Awards to Besponsible Classes^ 
after Account taken at the Advent of Christ, 

The " Last Day " of popular belief — Universal resurrection an absurdity — the ignorant 
and the brutish never raised — judgment restricted to those who are responsible — the 
source of responsibility — God's dealings with the human race — the antediluvians — the 
call of Abraham — the election of the Jews — national responsibility — Christ the Judge of 
the quick and the dead — a part of the gospel — the necessity for a judgment seat — a 
fallacy — ^Divine omniscience no argument against a judgment — Divine accommodation 
to human creatures illustrated in history — the perniciousness of the fallacy — the glad- 
someness of the doctrine of judgment — the object of judgment— the official and public 
separation of good from evil — the parables of Christ and the statements of Paul — the 
presence of the unrighteous at the judgment-seat, a necessity — the position of the 
resurrected dead before judgment — the great question undecided — the body unglorified 
— immortality not bestowed — the judgment an individual reckoning — "Immortal 
resurrection," a mistake and a heresy — review of supposed New Testament proofs of 
immortal emergence from the grave — conclusion. Page 91. 

LECTURE V. 

BihU Teaching concerning God, Angels, Jesus Christ, and tJie Crucifixion^ 
shown to he subversive of Orthodox Views, 

Importance of the subject — the truth mystified by Trinitarianism — the orthodox Trinity 
an absurdity — the " Trinity" of the Bible — the Father ONE — unity in material creation 



11 

—the source of power— an UNKNOWN CENTRE— Deity in person localised in " The 
heavens " — His manifestation on earth — the occurrences at Sinai an evidence of His 
reality— God's existence underived — His omniscience by spirit— the relation between 
Father and Spirit : not two persons, but one power in two aspects — Spirit, the agency 
wielded by the Father — the spirit a universal element in nature — electricity — Holy 
Spirit as distinct from spirit — its outpouring on the day of Pentecost — the supernatural 
powers of Jesus and the Apostles— the object of these in the conviction of men — the 
gifts of the Spirit in the government of the early churches — absence of spirit-manifest- 
ation in the present day — modern pretences — the Delusions of Orthodox gospel- 
preaching — the sword of the spirit the word oi God — Angels — the names of God upon 
them — a difficulty explained — angels corporeal beings in perfection — the pattern of the 
righteous — the nature of Christ : two opinions — a third, the truth — Christ, a man con- 
stituted Son of God by the mode of his conception, and by subsequent anointing with 
the Spirit and the resurrection — the evidence thereof — Christ's statements of himself— 
contrary views considered — THE CRUCIFIXION — a manifestation of love — the princi- 
ples involved — Adam's condemnation — human disobedience — the eternal law met and 
triumphed over in Christ's death and resurrection— the means of securing the benefit — 
belief of the truth and baptism — the relation of Christ's death to the Jews and the law 
of Moses — an appeal. Page 117. 

LECTUHE V (a). 

The Devil not a Personal Agent or Supernatural Fewer of Evil, hut a scriptural 
Personification of Sin in its several for 7ns of Manifestation. 

The position of the devil in modern theology — the importance of knowing whether there 
is a personal devil or not — the Bible doctrine of the devil an integral part of the gospel — 
the orthodox devil a fiction — his immortal existence impossible — a mortal devil an 
absurdity — no formal devil theory in the Bible — the temptation in the Garden of Eden — 
the serpent the tempter — " Satan " out of the question — the tradition about the devil 
being a fallen angel examined — the fallen angels of Jude and Peter not alive — consigned 
to death for their disobedience — the earth the probable scene of their rebellion — the 
*' dragon " of Revelations a political symbol — the Hebrew word " Satan," its use and 
meaning in the Old Testament — where translated and where untranslated— Job's . 
"Satan" — other instances — "Satan" in the New Testament — " Satan " at Pergamos — 
Peter a "Satan" — the " Satan" to whom perverts were handed over by the api'Stles — 
Paul's " Satan ''—the " Satan " that entered into Judas — the spirit of the flesh the great 
"Satan" — the poptilar "Satan"' excluded by experience— " Devil " a Greek word- 
its meaning— its use in the New Testament, translated and untranslated — the devil 
destroyed by Christ — sin put away — sin in the flesh the great devil — " devil ' a persjni- 
fication of a principle— personification common in the Scriptures— illustrations— the 
reason of sin being called the devil — the fall — instigation of the serpent which con- 
stituted itself the calumniator (devil) of God, and the adversary (Satan) of man — the 
works thereof — mankind the children of the devil, and, aggregately, the devil himself — 
the temptation of Jesus — casting out of devils (demons) — the origin of the expression — 
demons of Pagan invention — the theory reflected in ancient language— Christ's con- 
formity to popular speech — " demons," a name for epileptic disorders— modern parallels 
—a declaration. Page 150. 



12 

LECTURE VI. 

I'he Kingdom of God not yet in existence, but to he established visibly 
on the Earth at a Future Day, 

The importance of understanding the kingdom of God — its relation to the gospel — the cru- 
cifixion only a part of the gospel— different ideas of the kingdom— its true nature shown 
from the Scriptures — God's purpose to break up the existing system of nations, and to 
establish a kingdom of His own — Nebuchadnezzar's dream— Daniel's interpretation — its 
verification in history — the crisis at the door — the stone — kingdom of God on earth — the 
lung — the aristocracy — the people, the territory, the laws, the government of the future age 
—an ideal despotism — glorious results — the kingdom preached by Jesus and the apostles 
out of the prophets — the sacrifice of Christ in relation to the gospel — popular preaching 
destitute of the kingdom— the practical teaching of the New Testament and the king- 
dom of God — the attidude of modern professors to the kingdom of God — the duty of 
the honest. Page 182. 

LECTUHE YI (A.) 

The Fromises made to the Fathers (Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob), yet to be fulfilled 
in the Setting-up of the Kingdom of God on the earth. 

New Testament references to the promises — the common view — an orthodox mistake 
— the promises unfulfilled— the promises to Abraham quoted — analysis of the promises 
— the Abrahamic nation of the future — the promised land — Palestine never yet occupied 
under the promise but under the law— hope of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob — the city 
having foundations — prophetic announcements — the fulfilment of the promise — Christ 
co-heir with Abraham— the saints future joint possessors with them — the Holy oblation 
of the land— the divine encampment— arithmetical objections and answers— Christ a 
future conqueror — the future blessedness of the nations when Christ reigns— no blessed- 
ness at present, except individual, and that in a very feeble degree — the mission of the 
law of Moses— reason of the promises being made— an impossibility versus a necessity — 
solution in the confirmation of the promises by Christ — the new covenant — the 
conclusion of the whole matter. Page 20-i. 

LECTURE YII. 
, The Kingdom of God the Final Instrumentality in the Great Schema 

of Human Medemption. 
Wisdom of God's designings — the kingdom of God — its mission— suppression of "all 
enemies" on the earth — order of their subjugation — mal-government, as in Africa, 
Asia, Europe, &c. — ignorance and depravity — reformatory institutions of the future 
age — Jerusalem the centre of enlightenment— national pilgrimage — abolition of death — 
the time when — the mode of its extinction — post-millennial rebellion of nations — final 
judgment— the book of life— the lake of fire — abdication of Christ — the eternal ages — 
the kingdom a transitional dispensation. Page 220. 

LECTURE YIII. 

Christ the Future King of the World. 

Popular views of Christ's character and mission — their defectiveness demonstrated — 
kingship of Christ— Jewish notions — expectations of the disciples— modern condemna- 




13 

tion— the testimony of the prophets— New Testament corroboration— the angelic 
annunciation— the throne of David — Christ the heir — incidents at Bethlehem — Christ's 
care for Jerusalem— destiny of the city— metropolis of the future age— popular recogni- 
tion—parable of the vineyard— Christ's claims— his crucifixion— " Jesus of Nazareth 
the King of the Jews "—Glory of the future age. Page 231. 

LECTURE VIII (A). 

The Covenant made with David to he realised in the Bstablishment of 
the Kingdom of Israel under Christ. 

The Davidian clause in the Abrahamic covenant — New Testament proof that the 
covenant with David referred to Christ — the last words of David — their allusion to 
Christ — the text of the covenant — a preliminary objection— the covenant not realised 
in Solomon— its verification, so far, at Christ's first advent — Christ's sonship — his 
sufferings — his position as the first-born— his exaltation — part of the covenant not 
fulfilled — the throne of David to be restored, and occupied by Christ — prophetic 
testimony — David to be contemporary with the restoration— Christ the builder of the 
future temple — national worship in the future age — periodical pilgrimages to Jerusalem — 
Ezekiel's temple — evidences of its futurity — the measurement of the building — the new 
city — its size and magnificence — restoration of sacrifices — evidence of the fact— the 
reason of the thing— probation in the future age— spiritual education during the 
millennium — mystification of prophecy by orthodoxy — tyranny of established opinions 
—the system to be brokcA up by Christ at his coming. Page 245. 

LECTURE IX. 

The Second Coming of Christ the only Christian Hope. 
The beauty of Christianity — the one hope — importance of knowing what God has 
promised — future exaltation of the saints to power — prophetic intimations — Christ's 
promises — Popular perversity — three opportunities of correction — the result— death of 
Christ — his ascension— promise of return— his second coming the time of reward— 
post-ascensional preaching of the apostles— the hopes of converts— New Testament 
quotations — slumber of Christendom— necessity for preparedness. Page 264. 

LECTURE X. 

The Hope of Israel, or, the Restoration of the Jews a part of the Divine 
Scheme and an element of the Gospel. 

The Jews as commonly regarded — their importance in the divine schemes — salvation ag 
pertaining to the Jews — necessity of becoming true Jews in order to be saved — the hope 
of Israel— history of the Jews — their speciality as Gods nation— the "good things" 
promised to them— restoration to their own land— return of Christ to reign over them— 
identity of their hope with "that of the true Christian— difficulties considered. Page 278. 

LECTURE XI. 

Coming Troubles and the Second Advent, 

The end of the present dispensation — Setting-up of the kingdom of God— the circum- 
Btances attending the transition— a time of trouble suqh as never was— political 



14 

complications— a war spirit abroad — collision of nations — commercial derangement-^ 
great commotions — social troubles — universal distress— coming of Ohrist as a thief — 
manifestation of destructive judgments over the earth — slaughter of multitudes — 
punishment of the nations — "The war of the great day of God Almighty" — subjugation 
of the world and its object. Page 292. 

LECTURE XI (A,) 

Times and Signs ; or the evidence that the end is near. 

Times and seasons revealed — New Testament difficulties considered — prophecy 
intelligible — at the time of the end — how long ? — symbollic days— their scope illustrated 
by fulfilled prophecy— The times of the Gentiles nearly run — four or five modes of 
demonstration — millenary week— the seven times of Nebuchadnezzar — the 2,400 days 
of Daniel viii. — the fourth-beast little-horn period of time, times and a half — the 
Roman Empire— the Invasion of the Goths— the re-settlement of Europe in ten new 
political divisions — the little horn — appearance of the Papacy in Europe — its pride and 
usurpations— pretensions and blasphemy of the Popes — the Apocalyptic Mother of 
Harlots — the mystery of iniquity — crimes and heresies of Rome — the Man of Sin 
predicted by Paul— fulfilment in the Papacy — the individualist theory considered — its 
absurdities pointed out — approaching perdition of Rome — enumeration of her sins — 
signs of the end— the seventh vial — the River Euphrates and the three frog spirits — 
decadence of Turkey and predominance of French influence — Russia as a European 
conqueror — her invasion of Palestine and discomfiture on the mountains of Israel — 
current indications of the crisis — decrepitude of the Papacy — the attitude of Russia — 
Turkey falling to pieces— Jewish prospects — warlike temper of the nations — the coming 
of the storm — dawn of the millennium. Page 302. 

LECTURE XII. 

The Eefuge from the Storm; or, What shall we do to he saved? 

The way of salvation— invitation to all — submission to divine requirements demanded — 
popular delusions— Word of God mude of none efifect — necessity of faith— nature of the 
gospel — beauty of the divine arrangement — philosophy of belief — danger of Latitudin- 
arianism — poverty of morahsts — foolishness of the "wise" — the narrow way — baptism, 
its essentiality as a means of salvation— the Christian life — the Loid's SuiDper — first 
day of the week— Sabbatarianism confuted — value of the truih. Page 31b-. 



APPENDIX. 



A SUMMARY OP THE THINGS SET FORTH IX THE FOREGOIXG 
LECTrRES, SHEWX IN CONTRAST "NYITH THE TENETS OF 
ORTHODOX BELIEF .... . PAGE 363. 

A FEW WORDS TO THE INTERESTED READER . . . PAGE 36?. 

ADVERTISEMENTS OF CHRISTADELPHIAN WORKS • PAGE 371, 372. 



LECTURE I. 



TEE BIBLE— WHAT IT IS, AND HOW TO 
INTERPRET IT. 

Pebhaps some explanation is necessary on the part of a layman stepping 
forward to meddle with subjects which are supposed to pertain exclusively to 
the clerical province. The explanation is a very simple one. No one can 
seriously believe that the people around him are under the power of religious 
delusion, without feeling some degree of impulse to set them right if he can, 
and without to some extent lying under an obligation to do so. He does not 
require the license of the presbytery, bishop, or ecclesiastical court to do this. 
Ordination is unnecessary to qualify him to preach the gospel of Christ, or to 
exercise any spiritual function whatever. Authority in the matter comes with 
enlightenment. As soon as he understands and believes the gospel, he is bound 
to lend himself as an instrument for its diffusion. The command is direct from 
the mouth of the Lord Jesus himself: ^' Let Mm that hearetli, say Come," 
(Rev. xxii. 17); and the example of the early Christians leaves no mistake as 
to the duty: "At that time there was a great persecution against the church 
which was at Jerusalem, and they were all scattered abroad throughout the 
regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles . . therefore they that were 
scattered abroad went everywhere^ preaohing the word " — (Acts viii. 1 — 4). It 
is only long established human tradition that gives countenance to "holy 
orders," "license," or any other recognised ecclesiastical usage as essential to 
legitimate evangelization. The power of tradition in this matter seems at the 
present moment to be growing weaker. Their number is now legion who, by 
mouth and pen, assert the common sense and apostolic view that the truth of 
God is designed to make propagandists of all of whom it makes property, and 
tha,t white neck-cloth-ism is a branch of the apostacy. 

The subject of tlus afternoon's lecture is the starting point of all that can be 
said on "the religious errors of the times." The teaching of the Eible is the 
great standard by which, in such a matter, everything is to be determined ; 



14 

and it is therefore important, by way of natural approacli to the subject, to 
make some enquiries as to what the Bible is, and by what method its teachings 
are to be elucidated. 

The Bible is a book with which we have all been familiar from the day on 
which we began to be conscious — a book to wliich we have always been 
accustomed to attach a superhuman importance. On this point, we shall assume 
throughout these lectures that this regard is justifiable — that it is proper and 
logical to believe that the Bible is a book of divine authorship. "We do not 
propose to examine the evidence which, to logical thinking, conclusively proves 
this ; we simply mean to look at its structure and character as a book appearing 
before us with certain pretensions taken for granted. On looking into it, we 
find it consists in reality of a number of books written at different times by 
different authors. It opens with five, f amiUarly known as the " five books of 
Moses." These occupy a position of fii'st importance. They constitute the basis 
of all that follow. Commencing with an account of the creation and peopling 
of the earth, they chiefly treat of the origin and experience of the Jews, of 
whom Moses says " The Lord hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto 
HimseK, above all the nations that are upon the earth" — (Deuteronomy 
xiv. 2). They also contaia the laws (very elaborately stated) which God 
vouchsafed by the hand of Moses for the constitution and guidance of the 
nation. It has now become fashionable, under the sanction of a Colenso, to 
question their authenticity, while admitting the possible genuineness of 
the remaining portions of the Sacred Eecord. Without attempting to 
discuss the question, we may remark that it is impossible to accept Christ 
while rejecting Moses. Christ endorsed the writings of Moses. He said 
*' They have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them; if they believe not 
Moses and the prophets, neither will they believe though one rose from the 
dead" — (Luke xvi. 29 — 31). It is also recorded that '"'''beginning at Moses 
and aU the prophets, he expounded unto them in all the Scriptures the things 
concerning himself." — (Luke xxiv. 27.) Further, he said '•''Had ye believed 
Moses, ye would have believed me: for he wrote of me. But if ye believe not 

HIS WRITINGS, HOW SHALL YE BELIEVE MY WOEDS ? " — ( John V. 47.) If Christ 

was divine, his sanction of the Pentateuch settles the question raised by 
Colenso ; if the Pentateuch is a fiction, Christ was a deceiver. There is no 
middle ground. They stand or faU together ; and the words suitable to those 
who reject the five books, and yet profess to be Christian, are to be found 
in the question quoted above, addressed by Jesus to the Jews, " If ye beUeve 
not the writings of Moses, how shall ye believe the words of Christ .^" 

The next twelve books present the history of the Jews during a period 
of several centuries, involving the development of the mind of God to the extent 



75 

to whicn that was imf olded in the messages prophetically addressed to the people 
in the several stages of their history. This gives them more than historical 
value. The book of Job is an exception. It does not pertain to Israel nationally. 
It is a record of divine dealings with a son of God at a time when that nation 
had no existence. Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Solomon, are 
the inspired writings of two of Israel's most illustrious kings — writings in which 
natural genius is supplemented with preter-natural spirit-impulse. In the books 
of the prophets, from Isaiah to Malachi, we are presented with the most important 
department of Old Testament Holy Writ. In these seventeen books — respec- 
tively bearing the names of the writers — ^we find recorded a multitudinous variety 
of messag-es transmitted from Deity to the ^'prophets," for the correction and 
enlightenment of Israel. These messages are valuable beyond aU conception. 
They contain information concerning God otherwise inaccessible, and endless 
instruction as to acceptable character and conduct, otherwise unobtainable; 
but perhaps that which gives them their transcendant value is their disclosures 
of God's purposes in the future, in which we naturally have the highest interest, 
but of which naturally, we are in the greatest and most helpless ignorance. 

Coming to the New Testament, we are furnished in the first four books with 
a history which is pregnant with results of eternal moment to the human 
family. The great Messiah, appointed of God to deliver our suffering race 
from aU the calamities in which it is involved, appears ; and here we have his 
history and sayings recorded for our study and profit. Part of that history is, 
•that he entrusted his apostles with a mission to the world at large ; in the Acts 
of the Apostles (a history of peculiar importance), we have made plain to us in 
a practical way, what Christ intended them to do as affecting ourselves. In the 
same book, we have illustrated to us in the proceedings of the primitive Christians, 
the real import of the commandments of Christ, and the real scope and nature 
of Christian duty. The remainder of the ISTew Testament is made up of a series 
of epistles, addressed by the inspired apostles to various Christian communities. 
These letters contain practical instructions in regard to the character which 
Christians ought to cultivate, and copious elucidation of the higher aspects of their 
religion. Without them we should not have been able to comprehend the Christian 
system in its entirety. Their absence would have been a great blank; and we in 
this remote age, should so far have been unable to lay hold on eternal life 

Such is a scant outline of the book we call "the Bible." Composed of many 
books, it is yet one complete consistent volume; written by men in every 
situation of life — from the king to the shepherd — and scattered over many 
centuries in its composition, it is characterised by a unity of spiiit and 
uniformity of teaching which distinguish it from any other similarly miscel- 
laneous production, and, among books, make it a marvel. It is ;i truly 



16 

"wonderful book, in whatever light we view it — the product of many centuries 
— the offspring of many minds — without parallel among the countless volumes 
of the library. There is no other instance of forty authors, living tn different 
ages, combining without possible concert or collusion, to produce a book which 
in all its parts is pervaded by one spirit, one doctrine, one design, and by an air 
of sublime authority which is its peculiar characteristic. The Book is a literary 
miracle. It is impossible to account for its existence upon ordinary principles. 
To suppose it a merely human production, is to undertake the impossible task 
of accounting on ordinary principles, for the unanimity of forty writers, living 
at different times, over a period of two thousand years, all characterised by a 
superhuman grandeui" of style, loftiness of principle, and purity of doctrine. 
We have also to deal with the significant fact, that nearly all the writers 
sealed their testimony with their own blood — submitted to all kinds of disad- 
vantages during life — ''had trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, yea, moreover 
of bonds and imiDrisonments ; were stoned, were sawn asunder, were tempted, were 
slain with the sword, wandered about in sheep skins and goat skins, in deserts and 
mountains; in dens and caves of the earth — ^being destitute, afflicted, tormented," 
(Heb. xi, 36 — 38), and all on account of their professed communications from 
heaven, which they themselves knew were either true or false. In fact, to 
suppose the Bible to be human is to raise insurmountable difficulties, and to do 
violence to every reasonable probability. The honesty and ability of the writers 
cannot be denied ; and yet on the rationalistic theory, we are forced into the 
position of beHe^.-ing that with all their integrity, they acted the knave, or that 
with all their n?.tive wisdom and genius, they played the fool. The only truly 
rational theory of the book is that supplied by itself, "Holy men of God 
spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost" — (2 Peter i. 21). In this 
we find an explanation of the whole matter. The presence of one supreme 
guiding mind, inspiring and controlling the utterances of the authors, completely 
accounts for their agreement of teaching throughout, and for the exalted nature 
of their doctrines ; on any other supposition, the book is a riddle, which must 
ever puzzle and bewilder the mind that earnestly faces all the facts of the case. 
Yet there are those who hold the book in contempt as a priestly imposture, 
IVIisled by teachers who deceive the judgTuent by sophistry, they are induced 
to reject the only book which can possibly be a revelation from Deity, and 
throw away their only chance of future perfection and immoitality : for surely 
if there be a book that contains the revealed will of God, that book is the Jewish 
Bible ; and if there be a possibility of deliverance from the evils of this life — 
tlie corruptibihty of our physical organization, the weakness of our moral 
natures, the essential badness of a great portion of the race, the disjointednee^ 
ttnd misconstruction of the social fabric, the bad government of the world — 



17 

that possibility is certainly made known to us in this book, and brought within 
our reach by it. The unbeliever sacrifices even an immense present advantage. 
He deprives himself of the consolations that come with the Bible's declarations 
of God's love for feeble humanity — with its glorious promises, so calculated to 
cheer the mind in distress — with its inspiring sun- lit pictures of eternal felicity. 
He deprives himself of the moral heroism which they impart, of aU the abiding 
support which they give, of all the beautiful and soul- elevating teaching which 
they contain, of all the noble affection they engender, of all their solace in time 
of trouble, their strength in the hour of temptation ; of all the nobleness and 
interest which they throw around a frittering mortal life. And what does he 
get in exchange ? License to feel himself his own master for a few mortal years, 
and then to sink comfortless and despairing into the jaws of a remorseless and 
eternal grave ! What an awful exchange ! If the Bible were a lie, it were 
better to receive its cheering fiction than to drag through the gloom of a vain 
existence. Better a happy life than a miserable one ; better a purposeful than 
an aimless one ; better a hopeful, expectant, joyful, elevated, noble life, than 
an unanticipating life of monotonous commonplace and routine ! Better, then, 
is it to beheve the Bible than to take refuge in the dismal comforts of Atheism. 

The effect of the Bible is to make the man who studies it, better, happier, 
and wiser. It is in vain for the leaders of Secularism to assert the contrary ; 
all facts are against them. To say that it is immoral in its tendencies, is to 
indulge in the asseverations of a madman. To declare that it makes men 
unhappy, is to speak against the truth: the tormented experience of the 
orthodox hallucinated to the contrary notwithstanding ; to affirm that it makes 
men wicked, is to be guilty of execrable folly. To parade the history of 
unrighteous government and tyrannical priestcraft in support of such propo- 
sitions, is to betray the shallowness of a logical idiot. But many are deluded 
by such a line of argument, and have the misfortune, in many instances, to 
become conscientiously impressed with the idea that the Bible is a hollow 
pretence — the production of a selfish and designing priestcraft. Such are 
objects of pity; in the majority of instances, they are hopelessly confirmed in 
their conceited delusion. 

It does not come within the scope of the present lecture to deal with the 
question of Bible authenticity ; and for two reasons, it is not expedient that it 
should be gone into : it opens out discussion which in its nature is interminable, 
and for the most part, barren and resultless ; secondly, the person who is not 
convinced by the moral evidence presented to his understanding on a calm and 
independent study of the Holy Scriptures, in conjunction with the historical 
evidences of the facts which constitute the bases of its literary structure, is not 
likely to be altered in his persuasion by theoretical arguments, however laboured. 



18 

The -plan of trying to show what it teaches, and thereby commending it to 
every man's sober judgment, will be found the most profitable. It maybe well, 
however, to notice an aspect of the question not often taken into account in the 
discussions Avliich frequently take place on the subject. The modern tendency 
to disbelieve the Bible must be traceable to some cause. Where shall we look 
for that cause ? The moral inconsistency of professing Christians has no doubt 
done sometliing to shake the faith of many ; the natural lawlessness of the 
human mind, is also an element in the various attempts to get rid of a book 
wliich exalts the authority of God over the will of man ; but is there not a 
m.ore fruitful source of unbelief in the doctrinal tenets of the very religion 
professed to be derived from the Bible itself ? At the risk of great offence, it 
must be asserted that this is the case — that these doctrines are in themselves so 
essentially irrational, inhuman, and absurd as to be repug-nant to every well- 
constituted mind, and to create a strong prejudice against a book which is 
supposed to be the source of them. If the Bible inculcated the doctrines 
which are preached in its name every Sunday, not one of us in the cool exercise 
of judgment, could accept it as a true book. "We mean seriously to affirm that 
in the course of religious history, there has been a great departure from the 
truth revealed by the prophets and apostles, and that the religious systems of 
the present day present such an incongruous mixture of truth and error as to 
perplex and baffle the devout and intelligent mind, and engender general 
scepticism. 

Do you mean to say, asks the incredulous inquirer, that the Bible has been 
studied by men of learning for eighteen centuries without being understood r 
and that the thousands of clergymen and ministers set apart for the very purpose 
of ministering in its holy things, are all mistaken ? A reply in the affirmative 
is apt to elicit expressions of impatience and incredulous indignation ; but a 
moment's reflection vdll induce moderation and patience. It will be admitted, 
as matter of liistory, that in the early ages. Christian:' "ly became so corrupted as 
to lose even the form of sound doctrine — that for more than ten centuries, 
Roman Catholic superstition was universal, and enshrouded the world in moral, 
intellectual, and religious darkness, so gToss as to procure for that period of 
the world's history the epithet of " the dark ages." Here then is a long period 
unanimously disposed of with a verdict in wliicli aU Protestants at least will agree, 
viz., "Truth almost absent from the earth, though the Bible was in the hands of 
the teachers." Succeeding centuries witnessed the " Reformation," which gave 
us the privilege of private judgment, and is supposed to have inaugurated an 
era of gospel light. About this there Tvill not be so much unanimity. 
Protestants are in the habit of believing that the Reformation abolished aU the 
errors of Rome, and gave us the truth in its purity. Why should they hold 



19 

this conclusion ? "Were the Eef ormers inspired ? Were Luther, Calvin, John 
Knox, Wyckliffe, and other energetic men who brought about the change in 
question, infallihle? If they were so, there is an end to the controversy; but 
who shall say they were ? No one who is competent to form an opinion on the 
subject. If they were not inspired and infallible, is it not right and rational 
to set the Bible above them, and to judge of their work in the light of human 
probabilities? Was it likely they should at once, and in every particular, 
emancipate themselves from the spiritual bondage of Eomish tradition? Was 
it to be expected that from the midst of great darkness, they should instantly 
come upon the blaze of truth ? Was it not more likely that their achievements 
in the matter would only be partial, and that their new-born Keformation 
would be swaddled with many of the apostate doctrines of the G-reat Mother 
of Harlots ? History and scripture show that this was the case — that though 
it was a " glorious Reformation," in the sense of liberating the human intellect 
from priestly thraldom, and establishing religious liberty, it was a very partial 
reformation, so far as doctrinal rectification was concerned — that but a very 
small part of the truth was brought to light, and that many of the most 
enormous heresies of the Church of Rome were retained, and still continue to 
be the groundwork of the Protestant Church. Such as it was, however, the 
Reformation became the basis of the religious system afterwards developed 
in our country. Its doctrines were adopted and incorporated in them, and 
institutions founded for the training of men to advocate and expound them. 
Boys were sent to coUege in youth, and indoctrinated by means of catechisms, 
text books, treatises, and not by the study of the scriptures themselves ; and on 
issuing forth to the fuU-blown dignities and responsibilities of theological life, 
these boys, grown into men, had to bind themselves by oath to remain true to 
what they had learnt. Is it wonderful that with such a breeding, and hemmed 
in by such circumstances, depending in most cases for their livelihood on 
adhesion to collegiate doctrines, they did not get farther than the original 
Lutheran Reformation ? They were not in a position favourable to the exercise 
of independent judgment in religious matters, and were therefore prone to 
acquiesce in what they were brought up to, from the mere force of habit and 
interest, sanctioned and streng-thened no doubt by the belief that it was, and 
must of necessity be true. And this is the position of the clergy of the present 
day ; the result is therefore a natural one — not very much to be wondered at — 
the system is unchanged. The ministry contiaues to be a profession for which 
a man must have a collegiate training from youth, and to which in no case he 
can be admitted without swearing fealty to the principles of the "denomination." 
With a continuance of the system, we have a perpetuation of the evil ; and thus it 
is that we can understand how the religious teachers of the people may be griev- 



20 

ously in error, wliile possessing all the apparent advantages of superior learning. 

It may be suggested that the extensive circulation of the Bible among the 
people is a guarantee against imposture. It ought to be so ; but we know as a 
matter of fact that the people with almost one accord leave the Bible to their 
ministers. They are too much engrossed in the common occupations of life, to 
give it that independent and diligent study which it requires for critical purposes. 
Everything is taken for granted. Of course there are exceptions ; but the rule 
is to receive as unquestionable the doctrines of our early days ; and with this 
beam in the eye, most people fail to see the truth even in the reading of it. 
Sometimes it happens that a thoughtful reader comes upon something which he 
has a difficulty in reconciling with received notions. There are two ways in 
which the thing comes to nought. The minister is consulted ; and he gives a 
decided opinion, which, however arbitrary and unsupported, has to be accepted as 
final. If the enquirer is not satisfied, his business or his " connection" with the 
congregation suggests to liim the expediency of keeping silent on " untaught 
questions." If, on the other hand, he be of the reverential and truly conscientious 
type, though unable to satisfy himself of the correctness of the explanation 
prescribed, he thinks of the array of virtue and learning which appears on the 
side of the suspected doctrine, and concludes that his judgment must be at fault, 
and that the safest course will be to receive the ministerial dictum with 
unquestioning faith ; and so the difficulty is hushed up, and thus, you see, the 
great system of religious error is protected from assault by the most potent 
machinery, and is invincibly perpetuated from day to day among a well-disposed 
and unsuspecting, but religiously ignorant and deluded people. This state of 
things is producing its effects. Infidelity is rising rife amongst us — the uncon- 
cerned are getting more indifferent, and the intelligent among devout persons are 
growing dissatisfied without very weU knowing why. What is to be done under 
these circumstances ? Let the people throw aside the bondage of tradition. Let 
them rise to a true sense of their individual responsibility in the matter of 
religion. Let them throw away the delusion that theoretical religion is 
exclusively the business of the minister, and see it to be their duty to go to the 
Bible for themselves, to fiiid out what it teaches and what it discountenances. If 
they study diligently and devotedly, they will discover something that will make 
them wonder that they ever regarded poj)ular rehgion as the truth of God, and 
will obtain a foundation on which the highest and most searching exercise of 
reason will not conflict with the most fervent and child-like faith. They wiU 
realise in themselves the frame of mind expressed in the words of the prophet. 
*' Truly our fathers have inherited lies ; vanity and things wherein is no profit." 

The second part of the subject is not less important than the first — " How to 
interpret the Bible." By way of introduction to it, we direct attention to a 



21 

statement of Paul to Timotliy — " The Scriptures are able to make thee rvise imto 
salvation." The Scriptures make wise; how? Obviously by the communication 
of ideas to the mind. But how are these ideas communicated ? There is only 
one answer : by the language it employs. Hence, with certain qualifications, the 
Bible means what it says. It may seem superfluous to emphasize on this simple 
principle, but this emphasis is rendered necessary by the prevalence of a theory 
that the Bible is not to be understood by any of the ordinary rules of speech, 
but employs language, in a non-natural sense, which has to be con- 
strued and rendered and interpreted in a skilled manner. We shall illustrate 
this in order to make the idea more apparent. Suppose it were said to an 
orthodox friend, "The Bible is a written revelation from God, and if a 
revelation, is written in language capable of being understood by those to whom 
it was sent," there is no doubt that he would agree to the proposition. But let 
the principle be applied ; suppose his attention were directed to the following 
statements of Scripture : — " The Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his 
father David (Luke i. 32), and he shall be ruler in Israel (Micahv. 2); and shall 
reign over them in Mount Zion (Micah iv. 7) . Yea, all kings shall fall down 
before him ; aU nations shall serve him : his dominion also shall be from sea to 
sea, from the river to the ends of the earth (Ps. Ixxii. 8 — 11) ; for he shall come 
in the clouds of heaven, and there shall be given unto him a kingdom, glory and 
dominion, that all peoples, nations, and languages may serve and obey him" 
(Dan. vii. 13, 14) ; and "the moon shall be confounded, and the sun ashamed when 
the Lord of Hosts shall reign in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, and before his 
ancients gloriously" (Isaiah xxiv. 23) ; and suppose the remark were made, "It 
seems plain from this that Christ is coming to the earth again, and that on his 
return, he v^iU supersede existing rulers, and reign upon the earth in Jerusalem, 
as universal king," " Oh! no such thing !" would be the instant response; "what 
the prophet says is spiritual in its import. Jerusalem means the church, and the 
coming of Christ again to reign, means that the time is coming- when he will be 
supreme in the heart and affections of men." This is what many would say, and 
what many do say in regard to such statements of Scripture. And we have a 
right to insist upon unanswerable reasons for such a strange method of treating 
the words of divine revelation. It cannot be justified on the plea that the Bible 
directs us so to understand its words. There are, in fact, no formal instructions 
on the subject. The Bible comes before us to teU us certain things, and it 
performs its office in a direct and sensible way, going at once to its work without 
any scholastic preliminaries, taking it for granted that certain words represent 
certain things, and using those words in their current significance. The best 
evidence of this is to be found in the correspondence between its terms, literally 
understood, and the events they relate to. The events wliich form the burden of 



them are fortunately, in hundreds of cases, open to universal knowledge in sucli 
Va way that there can be no mistake about them, and this gives us the immense 
advantage of an infallible standard for determining the bearing of Scripture 
statements. 

Take a prophecy : — 

'* I will make your cities waste, and bring your sanctuaries into desolation, and T 
will not smell the savour of your sweet odours, and I unll bring the land into 
desolation; and your enemies which dwell therein shall be astonished at it, and I will 
scatter you among the /leai/ien, and will draw out a sword after you; and your land 
shall he desolate^ and your cities waste.'' — Leviticus xxvi. 31-33. "And thou shalt 
become an astonishment y a proverb^ and a byword among all nations whither the Lord 
shall lead thee.'" — Deut, xxviii. 37. 

There is no dispute about the mode in which this has been fulfilled. The most 
inveterate spiritualisticism is bound to recognise the fact that the subject of these 
words is the literal nation of Israel and their land, and that in fulfilment of the 
prediction they contain, the real Israel were driven from their real, literal land, 
which became really and literally desolate^ as it is this day, and that Israel has 
become a literal by- word and a reproach throughout the earth. This being so, 
on what principle are we to reject a literal construction of the following ? — 

"I will take the children of Israel from among the heathen, whither they be gone, 
and will gather them on every side, and bring them into their own land. And I 
will make them one nation in the land upon the mountains of Israel, and one king 
shall be king to them all ; and they shall be no more two nations, neither shall they 
be divided into two kingdoms any more at all. ' — Ezek. xxxvii. 21, 22. 

It is usual, with this and other similar predictions of a future restoration of 
the Jews and their re-instatement as a great people under the Messiah, to contend 
that they mean the future glory and extension of the church. How unwarrant- 
able such an understanding of them appears in the fulfilled prophecies of 
Jewish calamities. 

Take another instance : — 

'« But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the housands of -Tudah, 
yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel." — Micah v. 2. 

How was this fulfilled ? Turn to Matt. ii. 1. 

" Now Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of Herod the King." 

The fulfilment of the prophecy is in exact accordance with a literal 

imderstanding of the words employed. 

In Zechariah, chap. ix. 9, we read : — 

•' Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion— shout, O rlarghter of Jerusalem: behold 
thy king cometh unto thee: he is just and having salvation, lowly and ridijig upon 
an asSi and upon a colt, the foal of an ass." 



23 

It is difficult to conjecture wliat the spiritualistic metliod of interpretation 
would have made of this prophecy, had it been still unfulfilled. We may 
certainly suppose with safety, that it would have been the very farthest from its 
conclusion, to suggest that the Messiah would really condescend so far as to ride 
on the literal creature mentioned in the prophecy, just as it is customary to 
refuse to beheve that Christ will sit upon a real throne, and be personally 
present on earth during the coming age, although that is, if possible, still more 
plainly declared j but how stands the matter ? 

Matt, xxi, 27. — " Jesus sent two of Ms disciples, saying unto them, Go into the 
village over against you, and straightway ye shall find an ass tied, and a colt with 
her ; loose them and bring them to me . . And the disciples went and did as Jesus 
commanded them, and brought the ass and the colt, and put on them their clothes, 
and they set him thereon. All this was done that it might be fulfilled which 
WAS spoken by the prophet, sayings'^' &c. 

And so we shall find with all fulfilled prophecies. They came to pass exactly 
as the terms of the prediction, plainly and literally understood, would have led 
us to expect ; that is, a certain thing was plainly predicted, and that thing 
came to pass. Is not this a rule for the understanding of unfulfilled prophecy ? 

But, it will be asked, is there no such thing as metaphor in the Scriptures : is 
there no such thing as predicting events in language that will not bear a literal 
construction, such as describing the Messiah as "a stone," "a branch," " a 
shepherd," &c. ? Yes, but this fact does not interfere with the conclusion just 
arrived at. It is a separate element in the case, co-existing with the other, 
without destroying it. Metaphor is one thing ; Literal speech another. Both 
have their functions, and each is so distinct from the other, that ordinary 
discrimination can recognise and separate them, though mixed in the same 
sentence. This wiU be evident by a Uttle reflection on the common use of 
language. 

"We use metaphor in our common speech ; yet we are never at a loss to 
perceive the metaphor when it is employed, and to understand its meaning. We 
never fall into the mistake of confounding the literal with the metaphorical. 
The difference between them is too obvious for that. When we talk of despots 
^'•trampling the rights of their subjects under their feet^'' we use a high metaphor ; 
but no one runs the risk of supposing that rights are bodily substances that 
can be literally crushed to pieces under the mechanical action of the feet. So 
with other expressions which are common : " He carries a high head," "a black 
lookout," ''^ hard times," "over head and ears in love," ''heart melting^'' 
"com dull,'' "beans heavy,'' "oats brisk," &c. These are metaphors in common 
use, weU understood, and beyond the danger of misconstruction ; but suppose 
We say, "The Polish nationality is to be restored," "The Emperor of France is 



24 

about to visit the Queen of England," *' A new kingdom has just been established 
in the interior of Western Africa," &:c. ; what would be thought of the man 
who should claim a " spiritual" or metaphorical meaning for these statements? 
Would he not be justly laughed at for his pains ? 

Now with regard to the Bible, it is a revelation in human language^ because a 
revelation to human beings. It is not a revelation of words but of ideas, and 
hence everything in its language is subordinated to the purpose of imparting 
them. The peculiarities and characteristics of human speech are observed and 
conformed to. 

Let us look at a few of its metaphors: — A place of national affliction is 
likened to an iron fui'nace. Says Moses, in the 4th chapter of Deuteronomy, 
20th verse — 

•' The Lord hath taken you, and brought you forth out of the iron furnace, even otrt 
of Egypt." 

The fact that Egypt is metaphorically spoken of as an ''iron furnace," does 
not interfere with the fact that there is a literal country of Egypt. Nations 
are said to occupy a position high or lo7i', according to their political position. 
Thus in Deuteronomy xxviii. 13, Moses says to Israel — 

" The Lord shall make thee the head and not the tail ; and thou shalt be ahoi^ 
only, and thou shalt not be heneathy 

Jesus says of Capernaum, Matt. xi. 23 — 

'•And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down 
U hell." 

Jeremiah, lamenting the prostration of Judah's commonwealth, says, 
Lamentations ii. 1 — 

" How hath the Lord covered the Daughter of Zion with a cloud in His anger, 
and cast down /row heaven unto the earth the beauty of Israel." 

Nations are sometimes likened to rivers and waters. In Isaiah vii. 7, 8, we 
read — 

" The Lord bringeth upon them the waters of the river, strong and mighty, even 
the King of Assyria, and all his glory." 

And hence, in referring to the constant devastations to which Israel's land 
has been subject at the hands of invading armies, the words of the Spirit are, 
*' whose land the rivers have spoiled." — Isaiah xviii. 2. 

Instances might be multiplied; but these are sufficient to illustrate the 
metaphorical element in the language of the sacred Scriptures. Metaphor there 
is without doubt; but this is a very different thing from that gratuitous and 
indiscriminatingrule of interpretation which, by a process called" spiritualizing, '^ 



25 

sweeps over the entire face of Scripture, and obliterates its every original 
feature, making the word of God of none effect. 

There is another style of divine communication differing from the literal, but 
sufficiently distinctive in its character to prevent its being confounded with the 
others ; and also sufficiently definite and intelligible to admit of exact compre- 
hension. The reference is to symbol, which is largely employed in what may be 
called political prophecy. In this case, events are signified or imported by 
hieroglyph. A beast is put for an empire, horns for kings, waters for people, 
rivers for nations, a woman for a governing city, &c. ; but this kind of revelation 
affords no countenance to the spiritualization of orthodoxy. It is special in its 
character, can always be identified where it occurs, and is always explicable 
on certain rules supplied by the Spirit itself in the word. The literal is the basis ; 
the elementary principles of divine truth are communicated literally; its 
recondite aspects are elaborated and illustrated metaphorically and symbolically. 
The one is the step to the other. No one is able to understand the symbolical 
who is unacquainted with the literal ; and no one can understand the literal who 
goes to the Scriptures with his eyes blinded by the veil which the ''spiritualizing" 
process has cast over the eyes of the people. This must be got rid of first ; the 
literal must be recognised and studied as the alphabet of spiritual things, and 
the mind, established on this immovable basis, will be prepared to ascend with 
almost infallible track, to the comprehension of those deeper things of God which 
are concealed in enigmas, for the study of those who delight to search out His 
mind. 

There remains one other important matter to be considered, Not long ago, 
on the occasion of an address on a kindred subject being dehvered in Dewsbury, 
a man put several questions. In answering them, the writer quoted from the 
prophets ; but was stopped by the remark, " Oh, but that's in the Old Testament ; 
we have nothing to do with that ; the New Testament is our standard : the Old 
has passed away." Now this sentiment is common among religious people. It is 
quite erroneous, and has done great mischief. It is true that the old dispensation 
of the law, or the old constitution of Israel, has been abolished — never more to be 
resuscitated; but it is very far from being true that the glorious promises of God, 
communicated through the prophets, have been annulled. One or two statements 
in the New Testament wiU. show this, and illustrate the estimation in which we 
ought to hold the Old Testament. Paul says, "The Scriptures are able to make 
thee Tiise unto sahafion.'' — (2 Tim. iii. 15.) Now it must be remembered that 
when Paul made this statement, the New Testament was not in existence; there- 
fore it could only refer to the Scriptures which were then extant, ^dz. : the 
Scriptures of the Old Testament. This is beyond doubt. Consider then the 
import of the statement — the Scrijjtures of the Old Testament are able to vialw 



26 

« 

t/^ WISE UNTO salvation; and yet some sneeringly talk of them as *'aii old 
Jewish Almanac," "a dead letter," &;c. Truly such persons are badly 
instructed, and wofully mistaken. 

And this statement of Paul's is by no means the only one. Hear what he 
said before Agrippa (Acts xxvi. 22) — 

"Having, therefore, obtained help of God, I continue unto this day witnessing both 
to small and great, sat/ in^' none other things than those which tlie prophets and Moses 
did say should corne.^* 

Now, if, in preaching the Christian faith, he said " none other things than 
those which Moses and the prophets did say should come," it is obvious Moses 
and the prophets must contain the subject-matter of that faith. This is 
undeniable. It is borne out and fully confirmed by an incident narrated in 
Acts xvii. 11, where, speaking of the inhabitants of Berea, to v/hom Paul 
preached, it says: — 

" These were more noble than those in Thessalonica ; . i . and searched the 
Scriptures daily, whether those things were so: therefore, many of them believed." 

If the Bereans were satisfied by a searching of the Old Testament, which 
were the only Scriptiu-es in existence at the time of their search, that what Paul 
aaid was true, is it not e^ddent that what he said must in some form be contained 
in the Old Testament ? Does it not follow that the Old Testament furnishes a 
basis of the things spoken by Paul ? That Paul's faith as a Christian laid hold 
of the Old Testament, is evident from what he said before Felix, the Roman 
Governor: — 

" After the way which they call heresy, S9 worship I the God of my fathers, 
believing all things which are ivriiten in the law and in the prophets" — Actsxxiv. 14. 

In harmony with this individual attitude of Paul in the matter, we find that 
when he went to Thessalonica, he entered the synagogue, and " three sabbath 
days reasoned with them 02Lt of the Scriptures'' (Acts xvii. 2), that is, out of 
Moses and the prophets, for there were no other Scriptures for him to reason 
out of. And when he called together the Jews at Eome, it is testified that '* he 
expounded and testified the kingdom of God, persuading them concerning 
Jesus, loth out of the law of Mows and out of the prophets^ from morning till 
evening." — (Acts xxviii. 23). 

The same fact, that the Scriptures of the Old Testament are accessary to the 
teaching of Christ and his apostles, is apparent in several other statements to 
be found in the New Testament. Peter exhorts those to whom he wrote in 
ver. 2, of iii. chap., 2nd epistle, "to be mindful of the words which were 
spoken lefore hy the holy prophets;'' and in the 19th verse of the 



27 

first cliap. of the same epistle, lie says, *' We have also a more sure word of 
2no2Jliecy, wheeeunto ye do well that ye take heed." Does not this settle 
the question ? Jesus puts this statement into the mouth of Abraham in a 
parable (Luke xvi. 29, 31) : — 

" They have Moses and the prophets ; let them heae them ;" " If they hesr not Moses 
and the prophets, neither -will hey be persuaded though one rose from the dead." 

And it is recorded of him that, during an interview with his disciples, after 
his resurrection (Luke xxiv. 27), "Beginning at Moses and all the peophets, 
he expounded unto them in all the Scri-ptures^ the things concerning himself." 
If the Saviour himseK appealed to the Old Testament in exposition of the 
things concerning him, and exhorted us to " hear Moses and the prophets,*' 
who will raise a voice against it ? What a great mistake people fall into when 
they suppose that Christianity is something distinct from the Old Testament ! 
Indeed, Christianity could not be comprehended without it. The New Testament 
is simply an appendage to the Old, valuable beyond all price, and indis]3ensable 
in the most absolute sense, but in itself far from being sufficient to give us that 
perfection of Christian knowledge, which constitutes a person " wise unto 
salvation." The two combined form the complete revelation of God to man, 
vouchsafed for his spiritual renovation in the present, and his constitutional 
perfection in the future. Divided, they are each inefficacious to " throughly 
furnish the man of God unto all good works." 

We must request the reader to suspend, his judgment on this point, and refrain 
from thinking too harshly of an idea which, though probably opposed to his 
dearest accustomed sentiments, is one that is sustained by the general teachino* 
and emphatic declaration of the word of God. This will be shoT\^l in the 
succeeding lectures, to which as a whole the conscientious dissentient is referred 
for an answer to his objections. 

Thus the subject of the present lecture is brought to a conclusion— " The 
Bible : what it is, and how to interpret it." It was necessary to go into these 
details by way of preliminary to the investigation which shall be entered into 
in subsequent lectures— clearing away errors and misconceptions, and laying a 
distinct and sure foundation for what shall afterwards be built. 

It only now remains for us to bespeak your sympathy for the subjects, and 
your patience with the necessarily somewhat dry and tedious process by which 
every point will be elucidated. It is a vital question, and worthy of all the 
labour which you can bestow upon it. We cannot be too particular in trying 
the evidence upon which our faith relies. Unfortunately, the majority of people 
are content to take it second-hand. They beheve what they have been taught 
at home, and in the church and chapel, without ever giving it a thought whether 



28 

it is rio-ht or wrong, or reckoning upon the awful consequences of error. The 
generality of people do not consider it their business to study the Bible. They 
leave it to the minister, and themselves stick fast in the intellectual mud, from 
which it is impossible to move them. They lack independence, and are slavishly 
subservient to their worldly interest. They hold their reputation too dearly to 
deviate from orthodox sentiment and usage. " They love the praise of men 
more than the praise of God." They are lethargic in spiritual matters to very 
deadness. Their faith is infinitely smaller than the minutest " grain of mustard 
seed." They are chained to the present in all their feelings ; and their actions 
work within the same narrow circle ; even the very future which they 
religiously profess to believe in, is to them a subject of dread. They have no 
ear for " the things concerning the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus 
Christ." With all their church- going and religious profession, their anxiety 
centres in the present evil world ; their absorbing solicitude is in the several 
grades of society, to secure wealth, to keep up a good name, or to provide for 
the wants of the flesh, and their best energies are exhausted in. promoting those 
ends. "They have a name to live and are dead." Kothing vdH arouse them 
but God's scathing judgments, descending destructively at the time appointed. 
They will then wake out of their dream of security — too late to mend. Let us 
take heed, my friends, while we have life, and health, and soundness of mind; 
let us labour diligently to obtain that pearl of great price — a knowledge of the 
whole will of God, and a disposition to obey His commandments ; and we shall 
then secure that good part which shall not be taken away from us. 



LECTURE II. 



EVMAN JS'ATURE ESSEXTIALLY MORTAL, AS PROP ED 
BY ''NATURE'' AXD REVELATIOX. 

Something like an apology is necessary for the views that will be advanced 
in the present lecture. Yet not an apology, for truth requires no apology. 
Nevertheless, the doctrine to be advanced is so utterly subversive of a point of 
popular creed, generally regarded as an essential feature of divine truth, that 
the course of argument may appear to savour of infidel tendencies, and, 
therefore, constrains deference so far to worthy feeling, as to assure the reader 
that the argument is prompted by no speculative wantonness, nor delight in 
tampering with settled and sacred tilings. The real and only reason for doing 



29 

what is about to be done, is a eonviction, most earnest and profound, that the 
doctrine of the immortality of the soul is an untrue doctrine, both philosophically 
and Scripturally considered, and effectually prevents the believer of it from truly 
apprehending the teaching of Christ. 

The universal theory of the human constitution is, that in his proper essential 
nature, man is a " spiritual," immaterial, and immortal being, tabemachng in 
a material body composed of organs necessary for the manifestation of his 
invisible and indestructible " seK " in this external and material world; but in 
no way beholden to that body for existence or identity. The organs composing 
the body are not regarded as any part of man's being; they are looked upon 
as things which the man uses as a mechanic employs his tools — the external 
agencies by which the behests of " the inner man" are carried out. All bodily 
functions are referred to the same category of material agency, while mental 
qualities — such as reason, sentiment, disposition, &c. — are set down as the 
attributes of the spiritual "essence" which is supposed to constitute himself, 
and to reside mysteriously in some part of the body's substance. The body is, 
of course, admitted to have had a material derivation " from the dust of the 
ground," but the " essence " is believed to have come from God himself — to be, 
in fact, a part of the Deity — a spark, or particle, scintillated from the Divine 
centre, having intelligent faculty and existence altogether independently of the 
substantial organism with which it is associated. In accordance with this 
view, death is looked upon as an accident which does not affect a man's being. 
It simply demolishes the material organism, and liberates the deathless, 
intangible man from the bondage of this " mortal coil," which having "shuffled 
off," he wings his way to spiritual regions, there to undergo eternal happiness 
or misery, according to "deeds done in the body." 

Those who hold this belief wiU not readily apprehend the idea which lurks 

behind the proposition of the lecture. Admitting the mortality of human nature 

in a certain general sense, they may be disposed to regard it as a truism, 

without perceiving that it expresses the opposite of their most cherished 

unbelief. Elaborated a little for the sake of expHcitness, the proposition would 

stand as f oUows : — 

Man is destitute of immortality in every sense. He is a mortal creature ot 

organized substance, energised and sustained in being by power emanating 

from God, which he shares in common with every living thing under the 

sun, and which he only holds on the short average tenure of three-score 

years and ten, at the end of which he gives it up to Him from whom he 

received it, and returns to the ground, whence he originally came, and his 

existence meanwhile is ohllterated in the grave. 

This is the idea expressed in the subject as stated. It constitutes the 



30 

affirmation of the lecture in opposition to the com in only received doctrine of 
the immortality of the soul, which is the basis of popular religion. A supple- 
mentary assertion is made in the second half of the subject, viz. : — that both 
*' nature " and revelation combine to establish this affirmation by the evidence 
-which they furnish. Evidence, then, is the main thing with which we shall 
have to deal. The e^ddence is of two kinds as mdicated — 1st, the testimony of 
existing natural facts : and, 2nd, the declaration of the inspired Word of God. 

To some it may seem inappropriate to take natural facts at all into account, 
in discussing a question in which the Holy Scriptures are allowed to have 
authority. The objection has some force, but when it is considered that nearly 
all the arguments by which the popular doctrine is supported, are derived from 
nature, it will not seem out of place to have recourse to the same source, seeing 
the object is to show that all the arguments upon wliich it is founded are 
fallacious, and that the doctrine has literally not a foot to stand upon. This 
must be the apology for entering* upon a department of reasoning wliich may be 
distasteful to purely sentimental minds, but which must be thoroughly ransacked 
before searching minds will be satisfied. We shall endeavour to show — 1st, 
that the natural facts adduced in support of the immortality of the soul do not 
in any way constitute proof of the doctrine ; and, 2nd, that certain natural facts 
exist which overturn the doctrine. The testimony of Scripture will then eome 
in as an appropriate and conclusive supplement. 

The first argument usually employed by those who set themselves philoso- 
pliically to demonstrate the doctrine, is a little subtle, but not difficult of 
refutation. It is contended that matter cannot think, and that, as man thinks, 
there must be some immaterial essence ia him that performs the thinldng, and 
that, beiag immaterial, this essence must be indestructible and, therefore, 
inmiortal. Stated in this curt and peremptory way, there seems at first sight 
to be strength ia the argument, but a little thought will reveal the weakness 
of it. Is it quite correct to assume that matter cannot think ? Of course, it is 
evident enough that stones, wood, iron, and inanimate substances ia general, 
are incapable of thought. No one would be so foolish as to assert the 
contrary ; but is it true universally that matter, or substance in every form 
and condition, is incapable of evolving mental power? To assert this would 
requii-e the assertor to be able in the fii'st place to define where the empire of 
what is called " matter" ends, and to prove that he was so familiar with ever 
part of its domain, as to be able to say with authority, that thought was 
impossibility ia it. What are the boundaries dividing that department o^ 
nature styled "matter," from that which is supposed to be the proAdnce oB 
"mind"? Earth, stones, iron, and wood would come iato the category of 
matter Avithout a question; but what about smoke? It maybe replied that 



^1 



31 

smoke, tliougli impalpable to the touch, is but a diffuse f oi;m of matter ; and as 
it will not be contended that smoke is an accessory to thought, except by the 
liberty of a metaphor, we may allow the answer to go. But what about light 
and heat, which can be evolved from the gross forms of matter first mentioned ? 
Light and heat can hardly be brought within any of the ordinary definitions of 
matter, and yet they manifestly have a most intimate relation to matter in its 
most tangible form. Nothing can exceed light in its subtilty and imponder- 
ability. Is it within or without the empire of matter ? It would puzzle the 
methodical metaphysician to say. And if perplexed with light, what would he 
do with electricity, a power more uncontrollable than any other force in nature, 
a principle existing in everything, yet impalpable to the senses except in its 
effect — invisible, immaterial, omnipotent in its operations, and essential to the 
very existence of every form of matter. Is this part of the "matter" from 
which the argument in question excludes the possibihty of mental phenomenon? 
If so, what is that which is not matter ? It will not do to say " spirit," if we 
are to take our notions of spirit •from the Bible, for the spirit came upon the 
apostles on the day of Pentecost "like a mighty rushing vrind," and made the^ 
place shake, showing it to be capable of mechanical momentum, and therefore 
as much on the list of material forces as light, heat, and electricity. Coming 
upon Samson, it energised his muscles to the snapping of ropes, like thread — 
(Judges XV. 14) ; and inhaled by the nostrils of man and beast, it gives physical 
life— (Psahn civ. 30). 

It is evident that there would be great difficulty in arriving at such a 
definition of matter as would sustain the argument under consideration. In 
fact, it is an impossibility. It is only an arbitrary system of thought that has 
created the distinctions implied in the terms of metaphysics. Nature — that is, 
universal existence — is one ; it is the elaboration of one primitive power; it is 
not made up of two antagonistic and incompatible elements. God is the source 
of all. In Plim everything exists ; out of Him, everything is evolved. 
Different elements and substances are but different forms of the same eternal 
essence or first cause — described in the Bible as " spirit," which God is ; and in 
scientific language as electricity. The word "matter," therefore, only describes 
an aspect of creation, as presented to finite sense; it does not touch the essence 
of the thing, though intended so to do by the shortsighted, because unexperi- 
mental and unobservant system which invented it. 

But if difficult to fix the limits of unsentient matter, there is another difiiculty 
which is equally fatal to the argument, viz., the difficulty of defining the process 
which is expressed by the word "think." It would be necessary to define this 
process before it would be legitimate to argue that every form of matter is 
incapable of it ; for unless defined, how could we say when and where it was 



32 

possible or not possible ? To say that matter cannot think is virtually to allege 
that the nature of thought is so and so, and the nature of matter so and so, in 
consequence of which they have no mutual relation. We have seen the 
impossibility of taking this ground with regard to " matter." Who shall define 
the modus operandi of thought ? Impossible, except in general terms, and 
these general terms destroy the argument now under review. Thought is a 
power developed by brain organization, and consists of impressions made upon 
that delicate organ through the medium of the senses, and afterwards classified 
and arranged by a function pertaining in different degrees to brain in human 
form, known as reason. This proposition accepted, destroys the metaphysical 
argument, since it aflfirms what the argument denies, viz., that the matter of 
the brain electrically energised is capable of evolving thought. 

The whole argument is based on a fallacy. It assumes complete knowledge 
of " nature's " capabilities, which is beyond human ken. Who knows what 
matter is essentially ? Chemists can tell the number and proportion of 
elementary gases which enter into any compound ; but who understands the 
essential nature of any one of those elements separately ? The more learned 
our gTeat minds become, the more diffident do they become on this subject. 
They hesitate to be certain about almost anything in which the secrets of nature 
are involved. None but the ignorant or the superficial would be so unwise as 
to draw the liiis fixing the limit of the possible. What is nature ? The sphere 
of omnipotence — the arena of God's operations. ShaU we say that anything 
is impossible with God ? True, inanimate matter, such as iron or stone, cannot 
think ; but we know experimentally that there is such a thing as " living matter," 
and that living matter is sentient and thinking by virtue of its organization, 
which is only another phrase for its divine endowment. This is a matter of 
experience, illustrated in degrees in every department of the animal kingdom. 

It is argued that the possession of "reason" is evidence of the existence of 
an immortal and immaterial soul in man ; but the logic of this argument is 
difficult of discovery. Reason is unquestionably a wonderful attribute and an 
extraordinary function of the mental machinery ; but how can it be held to 
prove the existence of a something beyond knowledge or comprehension, since 
there can be no known connection between that which is iucomprehensible and 
that which is unknown? To say that we have an indestructible soul because 
we have reasonable faculty, is to repeat the mistake of our forefathers of the 
last generation, who referred the achievements of macliinery to Satanic agency, 
because in their ignorance they were unable to account for them in any other 
way. We may be unable to understand how it is that reason is evolved by the 
organization with which God has endowed us, but we are compelled to recognize 
the seK-evident fact 



33 

Again, it is argued that the power of tiie mind to "travel," while the body 
remains quiescent is proof e^ its immaterial and, therefore, immortal nature. 
Let us see. What is this " travelling" of the mind ? Does th6 mind traverse 
aetual spaoe and witness realities? A man has been in America, has seen 
many sights, and returns home; occasionally he sees those sights over again; 
the impressions made on the sensorium of the brain through the organs of 
sight and hearing, while in America, are revived so distijictly that he can 
actually fancy himself in the place he has left so many thousands of miles 
behind. Surely no one will contend that each time this reverie comes upon 
him, his mind actually goes out of his body, and transfers itself actually to the 
place thought of ? If this is contended, it ought also to be allowed that the 
man, when so spiritually transferred, should witness what is actually 
transpiring in the country at the time of his spiritual presence^ and that, 
therefore, we might dispense with the post and the telegraph as clumsy 
contrivances for getting the news, compared with the facility and despatch of 
spiritualography. But this will not be contended. As well might we say that 
the places and persons we see in our dreams have a real existence. In both 
cases the phenomenon is the result of a process that takes place within the 
Drain. Memory treasures impressions received, and reproduces them as occasion 
occurs — clear, calm, and coherent, if the brain be in a healthy condition; 
confused, disjointed, and aberrated, if the brain be disordered, whether in sleep 
or out of it. In no case does reverie involve an actual transit of the mind from 
one place to another; and hence the "travelling" argument falls to the ground. 
If a man could go to China, while his body remained in Britain, and see the 
country and the people as they r^ially are, there might be something worthy of 
consideration, though even then it would not prove the immortality of the soul, 
but only the wonderful power of the brain while a living instrument, in acting 
at long distances through an electrical atmosphere. 

The power of dreaming is cited as another fact favourable to the popular 
doctrine; but here again the argument fails; because dreaming is invariably 
connected rvith the living brain. Besides, who ever dreams a sensible dream ? 
Dreams, in general, are a confused and illogical jumble of facts which have at 
one time or other been stowed away in the warehouse of the brain ; and if they 
prove anything concerning a thinking spirit, independ.^nt of the body, they prove 
that that spirit loses its power in exact proportion to its separation from the 
assistance of the body ; and that therefore without the body, it would be powerless. 

It is next contended that the spirituality of man's nature is proved by the 
fact that though he may be deprived of a limb, he retains a consciousness of 
that limb, sometimes, even, feeling pain in it. The argument is, that if the man 
is conscious of apart of himseK when the material organ of that part is wanting, 



34 

so will lie^be conscious of his entire being when the whole body shall be wanting. 
This looks very plausible : but let us examine it. "Wliy is a man conscious of 
an absent member ? Because the independent nerves of that member remain in 
the system from the point of disseverment vp to their j^lcLce in the brain ; so that 
although the hand or foot may be absent, the brain goes on to feel as if they 
were present, because the nerves that produce the sensation of their presence 
are stiQ active at the brain centre. But if, when you cut off a leg, you could 
also remove the entire nerves of the leg from the point of amputation up to their 
roots in the brain, and still preserve a consciousness of the severed member, 
then the argument for immateriality of nature would have something like a 
foundation. 

But the most powerful natural argument in favour of the popular doctrine 
has yet to be noticed. It is the one mainly relied upon by all its great advocates. 
It is this : it is an ascertained fact in physiology that the substance of our bodies 
undergoes an entire change every seven years ; that is, there is a gradual process 
of substitution going on, by which, atom after atom is expelled from the body 
as its vital qualities are worn out, and its place filled up by new material 
from the blood ; so that at the end of the period mentioned, the body is made 
up of entirely new substance. Tet, notwithstanding this constant mutation of tho^ 
material atoms of the body, and this periodical change of its entii-e substance,, 
memory and personal identity remain unaffected to the close of life. An old maa 
feels that he is the same person at eighty that he was at ten, although at eighty he 
has not a single particle of the matter which composed his body when a boy; and 
the argument is, that the thinking faculty and power of consciousness must be the 
attribute of some immaterial principle residing in the body. Now this has all the 
appearance of an unanswerable argument. However, we shall find that it is 
not so formidable as it seems. The question to be considered is — whether this 
fact of continuous identity, amid atomic change, can be explained in accordance 
with the view which regards the mind as a property of li^ring brain substance. 
"We shall maintain that it can ; because we find from experience that t'/ie 
qualities'' resulting from any organic conihinaticn of atoms are transmissihle 
to other atoms which may tahe their ijlace as organic constituents. An atom 
as it exists in food has no power of sensation; but let it be assimilated by the 
blood, and incorporated with any of the nerves, and it possesses a vital powei? 
which it formerly did not have. It becomes part of the organization, and feels, 
whether in man or animal. Why ? Because it takes up and perpetuates the, 
organic power which its predecessor has left behind. On this principle, we find 
that the mark of a scar will be continued :n the flesh through life ; and so also 
with discolourations of the skin, which exist in some persons from congenital 
causes. This perpetuation of j)hysical disfigurement could not take place if it 



35 

were not for the fact alluded to. Now if we apply this principle to the brain, 
we have a complete solution of the apparent difficulty on which the arguraent 
of the question is founded. Mind is the product of the living brain, and personal 
identity the sum of its ivi2)ressio7is. This will not be questioned by the student 
of human nature, though it may not be understood. Mental impression is a 
fact, though a mystery, alike in men and animals ; and facts are the things that 
wise men have to deal with. It is impossible to explain, or even to comprehend, 
the process by which thoug'ht is begotten in the tissues of the brain ; but that 
the process transpires will not be denied by those who have observed and 
cogitated. "We are conscious of the process, and feel the result in the possession 
of separate individuality — the power of contemplating all other persons and 
things objectively. Now in order to perpetuate this result, all that is necessary 
is to preserve the action of the organ evolving it — the brain — by means of 
nutrition. This, of course, involves the introduction of fresh material into its 
structure, but it does not imply an invasion of the unique process going on in 
it, which the argument in question supposes ; the process conquers the material, 
and converts it to its own uses, and not the material the process. Y/ho ever 
heard of a man's bone turning to wheat from the eating of flour ? The nutritive 
apparatus assifuikdes, which is in fact the answer to the argument. The new 
material entering the brain is assimilated to its existing condition ; and thus, 
although the atoms come and go for a life -time, the condition remains 
substantially unaltered, being sustained by the new material, much as a fire is 
kept up by fuel. If, then, we are asked how a man at eighty feels himself to 
be the same person that he was at ten, though his entire substance is changed, we 
reply, those brain impressions which enable him to feel that he is himself, have 
been kept up all along, though modified by the circumstances and conditions 
through which he has passed. The process of change is so slow that the new 
atoms take on the organic qualities of the old, as they are gradually incorporated 
with the brain, and sustain the general result of the brain's action in preserving- 
its continuous function unimpaired. If cases could be cited in which identity 
survived the destruction of the brain, the plea for immateriality would be 
unanswerable ; but so long as it is only to be found in connection with a 
peiyetuated brain organization, we are compelled to reject every theory which 
ignores this essential and significant fact. 

Thus it will be observed that none of the " natural " arguments usually 
advanced in support of the immateriality and immortality of the soul, are really 
logical. Each of them falls through when thoroughly tested. The evidence of 
the other side of the question wiU be found to stand in a very different position. 
At the very outset, we are confronted with the difficulty of conceiving how 
immateriality can inhere' in a material organization. Cohesion and conglome- 



36 

ration requii-e afiinity as their fii'st condition; but, in tids case, affinity is 
entirely wanting. 'V\Tiat connection can exist between " maifter " and the 
immaterial principle of popular belief ? They are not in the nature of things 
susceptible of combination. Yet in the face of this difficulty, we find that the 
mind is located in the lody. It is not a loose ethereal thing, capable of 
detachment from the material person ! It is inexorably fixed in the bodily 
framework, and never leaves it while life continues. If we enquire in what 
portion of the body it is specially located, we iustiuctively answer that it is not 
in the hand, nor in the foot, nor in the stomach, nor iu the heart, nor in any 
part of the trunk. Our consciousness unerringly tells us that it is in the head. 
We feel, as a matter of experience, that the mind cohabits with the substance 
of the braia. 

Extending our observation externally, we never discover mind without a 
correspondiag development of brain. Deficient braia is always found to 
manifest deficient reason, and vice versa. IMaster minds in science and literature 
have large and deeply convoluted cerebrums. These are facts that cannot be 
impugned. But how are we to explain them consistently with the theory 
which pronounces mind to be the attribute of an immaterial essence ? That* 
theory requires that mind be exhibited independently of either quantity or 
quality of organization. The facts in question are opposed to the theory; and 
the theory must therefore be dismissed in deference to the facts. 

Again ; if the mind were immaterial, its functions would be unaffected by the 
conditions of the body. ThinJdng and feeling would never abate in vigour or 
vivacity. We should always be serene and clear-headed — always ready for the 
" study," whatever might be the state of the bodily machinery ; whereas we know 
that the opposite is the case. Sickness or over-work will exhaust the mental 
energies, and make the mind a blank. Languor and dulness of spirits are of 
common experience. We can all testify to days of fretful ennvi^ in which the 
mind has refused to perform its lively office ; and we can remember, too, the 
uneasy pillow when horrible visions have scared us. This never happens in a 
good state of health, but always when the material organization is out of order. 
How is this ? Does it not tell against the theory which represents the mind as 
an immaterial, incorruptible, imperishable thing ? The mind is the offspring 
of the brain, and is therefore affected by all its passing disorders. 

Let us carry the process further. Let the brain be internally injured ; and 
we then perceive a most signal refutation of the popular idea ; the mind vanishes 
altogether. We make the following extract from the American Advent Revierv, 
in illustration : 

" Richmond mentions the case of a woman whose brain was exposed in consequence 
of the removal of a considerable part of its bony covering by disease. He says, 'I 



37 

repeatedly made a pressure on the brain, and each time suspended all feeling and all 
intellect, which were immediately restored when the pressure was withdrawn.' Tke 
same writer mentions another case. He says, ' There was a man who had been 
trepanned, and who perceived his intellectual faculties failing, and his existence 
drawing to a close, every time the effused blood collected upon the brain so as to 
produce pressure,' '' 

Prof. Chapman, in one of his lectures, says, " I saw an individual with his skull 
perforated, and the brain exposed, who was accustomed to submit his brain to be 
experimented upon by pressure, and who was exhibited by the late Prof. Weston to 
his class. His intellect and moral faculties disappeared on the application of pressure 
to the brain. They were held under the thumb, as it were, and restored at ple^Mrare 
to their full activity by discontinuing the pressure." 

But, of all facts, the following, related by Sir Astley Cooper, in his surgical 
Lectures, is the most remarkable: " A man of the name of Jones, received an injury 
on his head while on board a vessel in the Mediterranean, which rendered him 
insensible. The vessel soon after made Gibraltar, where Jones was placed in the 
hospital, and remained several months in the same insensible state. He was then 
carried on board the Dolphin frigate to Deptford, and from thence was sent to St. 
Thomas's Hospital, London. He lay constantly on his back, and breathed* with 
difficulty. When hungry or thirsty, he moved his lips or tongue. Mr. Clyne, the 
surgeon, found a portion of the skull depressed, trepanned him, and removed the 
depressed portion. Immediately after this operation, the motion of his fingers, 
occasioned by the beating of the pulse, ceased, and in three hours he sat up in bed, 
sensation and volition returned, and in four days he got up out of his bed and 
conversed. The last thing he remembered was the occurrence of taking a prize m 
the Mediterranean. From the moment of the accident, thirteen months and a few days 
"before oblivion had come over him, all recollection ceased. Yet on removing a small 
portion of bone which pressed upon the brain, he was restored to the full possession 
of the powers of his mind and body." 

How are such cases to be explained in accordance with the popular theory of the 
mind ? If a derangement of the material organization suspend mental operation, 
obviously the mind is not the attribute of a principle existing in us independently 
of that organization. The facts cited show that thinking is dependent upon the 
function of the brain, and cannot therefore be the action of an immaterial 
principle, which could never be affected by any material condition whatever. 

There are other difficulties. If the mind be a spark from God — if it be a part 
of the Deity Himself, transfused into material organizations (and this is the 
view contended for by believers in the immortality of the soul) our faculties 
ought to spring forth in maturity at birth. How then shall we explain infantile 
inanity? A new-born babe has not a spark of intellect or a glimmer of 
consciousness. According to popular belief, it ought to possess both 
in full measure, because of the immaterial thinking principle. Why, then, does 
it not think ? Manifestly, the theory is wrong. No one can carry his memory 
back to his birth. He can remember when he was three years old ; only in a 
few cases can he recal an earlier date. Yet if popular beUef were correct, 
memory onglit to he contemporaneous with life from its very first moment. 

Again; if all men partake alike of this divine thinking essence which they are 



supposed to have inherited from Adam, or received individually at birth, why 
do they not manifest the same degTee of intelligence, and show the same 
disposition ? "Wliy is there such an iniinite diversity among men ? Why is one 
man shrewd, while another is dull and doltish ? — one vicious and depraved, 
while a fourth is high-souled and virtuous ? — some good, others bad ?— some 
kind, others harsh and inconsiderate ? — some docile and gentle, while others are 
fierce and untractable, and so on ? There ought to be uniformity of manifes- 
tation, if there be uniformity of power. 

These, then, are so many natural obstacles in the way of the doctrine which 
constitutes the very foundation of all popular religion. They disprove that man 
is an immaterial entity, capable of disembodied existence. They show him to be 
a compound — a cofeature of living organization — a being created from the dust 
of the ground, vivified with life from God, and ennobled with qualities which 
constitute him "the image of God;" but nevertheless mortal in constitution. 
Why should there be so much inveterate opposition to this view ? Is not aU na- 
tural evidence in its favour ? If there are mysteries in it, there is none the less 
obviousness. Mystery is no ground of disbelief. This is shown in the universal 
credence accorded to the much more mysterious doctrine of the immortality of 
the soul. If it come to that, we are surrounded with mystery. We can only 
approximate to truth ; the lioiv of any organic process is utterly beyond 
comprehension ; yet this does not prevent us in most matters from recog-nizing 
the result in its proper subordinate relationship. Though we are unable to 
understand the mode in which nerve communicates sensation, muscle generates 
strength, blood supplies life, &c., we do not deny that these agencies are the 
proximate causes of the results developed, whether in man or animals. Now 
why should there be an exception in the case of thought ? What we know of it 
is all connected with physical organization. We have no experience of human 
mind apart from human brain. In fact, we have no experience of any human 
faculty apart from its material manifestation; and in ordinary sensible 
thinking, the various living powers of man are seen and practically acknowledged 
to be the properties of the numerous organs which collectively compose himself. 
If he sees, he has an eye to see ; if he hears, he has an ear to hear; and without - 
these organs, he can neither see nor hear ; and in proportion as these organs are 
perfectly formed, is there perfect sight or hearing. "WTiy should this principle 
not be applied to the mind ? The parallel is complete. Man thinks, and he 
has a brain to think with ; and in proportion as the brain is properly organized 
and developed, does he think comprehensively and well. If it be large, there is 
power and scope of mind ; if small, there is mediocrity ; if below par, there is 
intellectual deficiency, as illustrated in the case of idiots. These are facts apai*t 
altogether from the modern science of phrenology; and their tendency is 



^1 



39 

unmistakable. TTiey prove tlie coimection of mind with living brain-substance, 
however mysterious that connection may be, and overturn the theory of meta- 
physical abstraction. Some say "No" to all this; "the brain is simply the 
medium of the soul's manifestation; deficiency of intellect and other meiatal 
irregularities are the ]?esult of imperfection in the medium^hip:" but here again 
gratuitous theory is introduced. The answer begs the question. It assumes 
the very point at issue, viz., the existence of a thinking abstraction to manifest 
itseK. This kind of argument would not be admitted in the consideration of 
any other question. But suppose we accept the explanation, it avails nothing 
for the popular theory; for if the soul cannot manifest itseK — cannot reason, 
reflect, be conscious, love, hate, &c. — without a material "medium," what is its 
value as a thinking agent when without that medium ; that is, when the body 
is in the grave ? The explanation, however, cannot be accepted. It is the 
ingenious suggestion of a philosophy which is in straits to preserve itseK from 
confusion. How much wiser to recognize the fact which presents itself to our 
actual experience, namely, that all our conscious, as well as unconscious powers 
as Hving beings, are the result of a conjunction between the life-power of God 
and the substance of our organizations, and do not exist apart from that 
comiection in which they are developed. 

From nature, we turn to the holy oracles, whose voice will perhaps be more 
heeded than the fallible deductions of philosophy ; and here we shall find a 
perfect agreement with the natural evidence in the case. The first thing to be 
noted is the conspicuous absence of those common phrases by which the popular 
doctrine is expressed. "Never-dying soul," "immortal soul," "immortality 
of the soul," &c., so constantly on the lips of religious teachers, are forms of 
speech which are not to be met with throughout the whole of Scripture, 
from Genesis to Revelations. What a singular fact this is, if the doctrin-e 
imported by the expressions is a true one. If man is an immaterial, immortal 
being, destined for high and eternal spheres of existence after his brief sojourn 
upon earth is over, the truth is so unspeakably momentous as to demand the 
Bam.e authoritative and explicit enunciation in the Sacred Record, which it 
receives at the hands of "divines." All its essential teachings are plain, 
unequivocal, and copious. The existence and creative power of God — His 
purposes in regard to the future — the Messiahship of Jesus Christ — the object 
of his mission to earth — the doctrine of the resurrection, &c., are all enforced as 
plainly as language can express them ; but of the doctrine of the immortality 
of the soul, there is not the slightest mention, Tliis fact is acknowledged by 
eminent theologians, but does not seem to suggest to their minds the fictitious- 
ness of the doctrine. They argue the other way, a»nd assume that it is so 
seK-evident as to have been passed over by the sacred writers as a thing 



40 

understood, and not to be questioned. This is a very unsatisfactory "vray of 
getting over the difficulty ; because it would be equally competent and more 
appropriate to suggest the very opposite significance to the silence of the 
Scriptures on the subject, or in fact to put any construction upon it which 
learned ingenuity might suggest. The admission of such a style of reasoning 
would open the door for any kind of doctrine which might be put forward. For 
if silence mean consent in one case, why not in another ? If the immortality 
of the soul is to be believed without sanction from revelation, on the mere 
assumption that it is self-evident, may we not uphold any doctrine for which 
we have a prepossession ? A more rational course to pursue is to suspect a 
doctrine not divinely inculcated, and subject it to the severest scrutiny before 
receiving it. This is the course adopted in the present lecture ; and we shall 
find that the process will result in a complete break- down of the doctrine 
subjected to tl^ test. The Bible is not silent on the question involved, 
although it says nothing about the immortality of the soul. It suppHes direct 
and conclusive evidence of the absolute ephemerality of human nature, which 
in conjunction with its non- enunciation of the opposite doctrine, and the 
coincidence of natural evidence, establishes an unanswerable case. 

Some, however, may not be satisfied that the doctrine of the inamortality of 
the soul is not definitely broached in the sacred writings. Recalling to mind the . 
constant use of the word " soul," they may be disposed to consider that it is 
countenanced and endorsed in such a way as to render formal enunciation 
superfluous. For the benefit of such, it will be well to look at the use made of 
the word in the Scriptures, in order to see its meaning. First, let it be remem- 
bered that in its original derivation, the word "soul" simply means a breathing 
creature, without any reference to its constitution, or the duration of existence. 
This fact is strikingly illustrated in the renderings adopted by our translators 
in the first few chapters of Genesis. As applied to Adam it is translated soul 
(G-en. ii. 7) ; as applied to beasts, birds, reptiles, and fish, it is rendered 
"creature" and "thing" (Gen. i. 20, 21, 24, 28). The word originating in 
respiring existence as its primary signification, is employed to express various 
ideas arising out of this fundamental antecedent. It is put for persons in the 
following : — 

" And Abraham took • * the souls that they had gotten in Haran, and they went 
forth to go into the land of Canaan ;" that is, Abraham took all the persons, &c. — 
Gen. xii. 5. 

It is applied to animals in this : — 

" Levy a tribute unto the Lord of the men of war which went out to battle, one soul 
of five hundred, both of the persons, and of the beeveSf and of the asses, and of the 
«^eej)."— Numbers xxxi, 28. 



41 

It is also used to represent mind, disposition, life, &c., and that which it 
describes is spoken of as capable of hunger (Prov. xix. 15), of being satisfied 
with food (Lam. i. 11, 19), of touching a material object (Leviticus v. 2), of 
going into the grave (Job xxxiii. 22, 28), of coming out of it (Psalm xxx. 3), 
&c. It is never spoken of as an immaterial, immortal, thinking entity. The 
original word occurs in the Old Testament about 700 times, and in the New 
Testament about 180 times ; and among all the variety of its renderings, it is 
impossible to discover anything approaching to the popular dogma. It is 
rendered "soul" 530 times; "life, or living" 190 times; "person" 34 times; 
and "beasts and creeping things " 28 times. It is also rendered "a man," "a 
person" "self," "they," "we" "him," "anyone," "breath," "heart," 
"mind," "appetite," "the body," &;c. In no instance has it the significance 
claimed for it by professing Christians of modem times. It is never said to be 
immortal, but always the reverse. It is not only represented as capable of 
death, but as naturally liable to it. We find the psalmist declaring in Psalm 
xxii. 29, " None can keep aUve Ms own soul;" and again, in Psalm Ixxxix. 48, 
"What man is he that liveth and shall not see death ? Shall he deliver his 
^ovjj from the hand of the grave .^" And in making an historical reference, 
he further says, " He spared not theie soul from death, but gave their life 
over to the pestilence" — (Psalm Ixxviii. 50). Finally, Ezekiel declares (chap, 
xvui. 4), " The soul that sinneth, it shall die." 

We have to note another difference between Scriptural and modem sentiment. 
How common it is to indulge in rhapsodies upon the value of the supposed 
immortal soul. We frequently hear it exclaimed, " Oh! the value of one human 
soul ! Countless worlds cannot be placed in the balance with it !" Now we 
meet with nothing of this sort in the Scriptures. The sentiment there is 
entirely the contrary way. Take for instance this : 

" What is your LIFE ? It is even a vapour that appearethfor a little time, and then 
vanisheth away!" — James iv. 14. 

Or, Psalm cxliv. 3, 4 — 

" Lord, what is man that thou takest knowledge of him, and the son of man that 
Thou makest account of him ? Man is like to vanity; his days are as a shadow that 

passeth away.''' 

Or, Psalm ciii. 14-16— 

" He knoweth our frame, he remembereth that we are dust. As for man, his days 
are as grass, as a flower of the field so he flourisheth; for the wind passeth over it, 
and it is gone, and the place thereof is known no more.'' 

And more expressive than all, we read in Isaiah xl. 15, 17 — 

" Behold the nations arc as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of 
the balance. * * All nations before him are as nothing, and are counted to him 
LESS TiiAN NuTJiiNCi, lud Vanity." 



42 

And in Daniel iv. 35 — 

"All the inhabitants of the earth aee reputed as nothing." 

There is only one passage that looks a little different from this. It is this: 

*' What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own 
soul ? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul ?" — Mark viii. 36, 37. 

This is frequently quoted in justification of the sentiment in question ; but it 
•will at once be observed that the words do not describe the absolute value of a 
man's life in creation, but simply its relative value to himself. They enforce 
the common principle that for a man to sacrifice his life in order to obtain a 
thing which without life he can neither possess nor enjoy, would be to perpetrate 
the worst of all folly. Does any one insist that it means the "immortal soul'* 
of common belief ? Then let him remember that the same word which is 
translated " soul" in this passage is translated " life" in the one immediately 
before, in which if we were to read it " immortal soul," the absurdity would at 
once appear : — 

" For whosoever will save his immortal soul shall lose it, but whosoever shall lose 
HIS iMiioETAii SOUL for my sake and the gospel's, the same shall save it." — Mark viii. 35. 

What an awful paradox would this express in orthodox mouths ! But regard 
the words in the light in which we have already seen the Scriptures use it, and 
yoTi perceive beauty in the idea — preciousness in the promise. He who shriaks 
not from sacrificing his Hf e in this age, rather than deny Christ and forsake his 
truth, win be rewarded with a more precious life at the resurrection ; whereas 
he who renounces the truth to protect his poor mortal interests, will be excluded 
from the blessings of the life to come. 

In Genesis, we are furnished with an account of the creation of man, and we 
find its phraseology entirely coincident with the view advocated in this 
lecture : — 

"And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his 
nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul.'- — Gen. ii.7. 

Here we are informed that man was made from the ground, and that that 
which was produced from the ground^ was the being called max. "But," says an 
objector, " it only means his body." It is possible to say that it means anything 
we may fancy. A statement of this kind is worth nothing. There is nothing 
in the passage before us, nor anywhere else in the Scriptures, to indicate the 
popular distinction between a man and his body. The substantial organization 
is here called man — not his body. True, he was without life before the 
inspiration of the breath of lives, yet he was man. The life was something 
superadded to give man living existence. The life was not the man : it was the 
principle ; it was something outside of him, proceeding from a divine source, 



43 

and infusing itself into the wonderful mechanism prepared for its reception, 
" He breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul." 
This is frequently quoted in proof of the common doctrine — or rather 
mis-quoted, for it is generally given " and breathed into him a living soul;" but 
it really establishes the contrary. What became "a living soul?" The 
dust-formed being. If, therefore, the use of the phrase "became a living soul," 
prove the immortality and immateriality of any part of man's nature, it 
carries the proof to the body, for it was that which became a " living soul." 
But, of course, this would be absurd. The idea expressed in the passage 
before us is simple and rational, viz., that the previously inanimate being 
became a living being when vitalized, but not necessarily immortal, for, though 
a living soul, it is not said that he became an ''ever-living " or "never-dying" 
soul. 

But, whatever Adam may have been as originally constituted, the decree 
went forth that he should cease to be — that he should return to the state of 
nothingness from which he had been developed by creative power. 

" Because thou hast eateis of the tree of which I commanded thee, saying, thou shalt 
not eat of it, . . . in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return 
unto the ground ; for out of it wast thou taken ; for dust thou art^ and unto dust shalt 
thou return.'" — Gen. iii, 17-19. 

To say that this sentence merely relates to the body and does not affect the 

being, is to play with words. The personaUty expressed in the pronoun 

"thou" is here distinctly affirmed of the physical organization. "Tnouari^ 

dust.^^ What could be more emphatic? "Thou shalt return to the d^ist." 

This, of course, is utterly inapplicable to the intangible principle which is 

supposed to constitute the soul, and refers exclusively to man's material nature. 

This is Longfellow's view of the matter, if a poet's testimony be of any value 

on such a subject: 

" Dust thou art, to djast returnesft 
Was not spoken of the sonV* 

Ergo, it conclusively decides tha^t to be a man's constituent personality which 

undergoes physical dissolution, or at any rate, the indispensable basis of it. 

Abraham expresses this view in. the following words: 

" Behold now I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord, which am but diist and 
as/ies."— Gen. xviii. 27. 

This is Abraham's estimate of himself; but some of his modern friends would 
have corrected him. " Father Abraham, you are mistaken; you are not dust 
and ashes ; it is only your body." Abraham's unsophisticated view, however, 
is more reliable than "the (philosophical) wisdom of this world," wliich Paul 
pronounces to be "foolishness with God" — (1 Corinth, iii. 19). 

Paxil keeps company with Abraham: — "I know that in me (that is, in my 



I 



44 

fiesh) dwelleth no good ^hing — (Romans vii. 18), and tells us in general to 
" Beware of x:>hiloso]Dliy and vain deceit,' which are specially to be guardec 
against on this question. 

James (chap. i. 9, 10) adds to this testimony : 

"Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted ; but the rich in that 
he is made low; because as the flower of the grass he shall pas away;" 

Which is something like a reiteration of Job's words (chap. xiv. 1, 2) : 

" Man that is born of a woman '.s of fev^ days and full of trouble ; he cometh forth 
like a flower, and is cut down ; he fleeth also as a shadow and continueth not." 

Then come the preclusive words of Solomon, the wisest man of all : — 

*' I said (or wished) in mine heai*t concerning the estate of the sons of men, that 
God might manifest them, and that they might see that they themselves are beasts; 
for tbat which befaUeth the sons of men befaUeth beasts ; even one thing befalleth 
them; as the one dieth so dieth the other; yea, they have 0II one breath; so that a 
MAN HATH xo PEE-EiiTS'EXCE ABOVE A BEAST ; for all is vanity; all go unto one place ; 
all arc of the dust, and all turn to dust again." — Eccles. iii. 18-20. 

We can fancy the hasty believer in the popular doctrine getting impatient withM 
this statement: ''^ ]So pre-eminence ahove a heastT Had it proceeded from J 
less authoritative pen than Solomon's, it would have been stigmatized as 
slanderous and atheistical ; but there it stands, in all its invulnerable emphasis, 
as a sweeping condemnation to the flattering dogma which exalts human nature 
to equality with Deity. It reproves the arrogance of human philosophy, and! 
teaches the humiliating fact that man is " but flesh, a wind that passeth away 
and (of itself) cometh not again." 

Thus do the Scriptures combine with nature in pronouncing man to be a 
creature of frailty and mortality, who, though bearing the image of God, and 
towering far above all other creatures in his intellectual might, and in the 
gTandeur of his moral nature, is yet labouring under a cui^se which hastens him 
to an appointed end ! 

It is of the highest importance that this negative view should be enforced. 
It will no longer do to parley with the popular heresy. Duty to God and man 
compels the proclamation that the doctrine of the immortality of the soul is the 
great error of the age — ^the mighty delusion which overspreads aU people Kke a 
veil — the great obstruction to the progress of true Christianity ! It mischievously 
diverts the attention of perishing multitudes from the true bread of life, and 
gives mere chafl in exchange, which will profit them nothing. It turns them 
away from the living waters of an offered life, which they are invited to drink 
without money and without price, and points them to the broken cisterns of their 
own natures, which hold no water. It tells them they have life in themselves, 
and are as gods in nature; and thus inflates them with a conceit which is 



45 

offensive before G-od. It propounds the serpent's He, "Ye shall not surely die," 
and thus disqualifies them for entering "the way of life," and makes them the 
fitting subjects of Christ's lament to the Jews — " Ye will not come to me, that ye 
might have life " — (John v. 40). It is the basis of all the ecclesiastical tyranny 
which has cursed the world for centuries. It is the parent of all the religious 
fooleries which have outraged propriety, and chased intelligence into indifference 
and unbelief. It has paved the way for the absurdities and superstitions of 
Romanism, and supplied but too plausible a pretext for the existence and power 
of its execrable priest-craft. It has given rise to the belief in ghosts and 
apparitions, and in later days, has led to the development of the monstrously 
foolish system which is getting abroad under the name of "spiritualism." 
Words fail to describe the mischief it has done. It has rendered the Bible 
uniatelligible, perverted religion, and induced scepticism, by implicating 
revelation in its insane dogma. It has taken away the vitality of religion, and 
neutralized its interest by investing it with superstitious mystery, and making 
it 'a thing too much above the common experience and comprehension of 
mankind. It has robbed it of its vigour, and reduced it to a degenerate, 
effeminate thing, disowned and unpractised by men of robust mind, and heeded 
only by the sentimental and romantic. What is our duty in the case but to 
discard the evil thing — to ffing it to the moles and to the bats, and humbly 
accept the evidence of fact, and the testimony of God's infallible Word. 



LECTURE III. 



TSJS LEAD UNCONSCIOUS TILL TRE MEST7REECTI0N, AND 
CONSEQUENT ERROR OF POPULAR BELIEF IN HEAVEN 

AND HELL. 

Death is the greatest fact in human experience, considered in its relation 
to the individual. Its occurrence is inevitable and universal — its effect blight- 
ing and destructive to everything within the range of its baleful operation. 
Its gloomy shadow darkens every house. Its presence haunts us everywhere, 
saddening every joy, and embittering aU the sweets of Hfe. Who has not felb 
its iron hand ? Who has not beheld the loved one chilled and stiffened by its 
desolating blast ? The blooming child with all its prattling innocence and 
winning ways — the companion of youth, rosy and healthful and gay — the 



46 

cherislied wife, the devoted husband, the tried and trusty friend — ^which of 
them has not been torn from our side by the iron hand of this ruthless and 
indiscriminating enemy ? One day we have seen them with bright eye, beaming 
countenance, supple frame, and have heard the words of friendship and intelli- 
gence drop from their living lips : and the next, we looked upon them stretched 
on the bier, still, cold, motionless, ghastly, dead ! 

What shall we say to these things ? Death brings grief to the living. It 
overwhelms them with a sorrow that refuses consolation. It is not for them- 
selves that they mourn ; news of life would bring them gladness, even if friends 
were far distant, and intercourse impossible. No, it is for the dead that their 
hearts are pained within them. Now why is this ? If death be merely a change 
of state, and not a destruction of being, why all this heart-breaking for those 
who have fallen by its terrible sword P It cannot be on account of the 
uncertainties "beyond the grave ;" because our grief is quite as poignant for 
those who are beheved to have " gone to heaven," as for those about whom 
doubts may be entertained. Tears flow quite as fast for the good as for the 
bad, and perhaps a little faster. There is something inconsistent with the 
popular theory here. If our friends are really " gone to glory," we ought to 
feel as thankful as we do when they are promoted to honour "here below;" 
but we do not; and why? Because the strength of natural instinct can never 
he overcome by a theological fiction^ however hard we may try to believe it. 
Men ynh.TiQ\eT practically believe the occurrence of death to be the commence- 
ment of Hfe, when they see it to be the extinction of all they ever knew or felt 
of life. 

Yet, almost everybody theoretically believes that the dead are not dead, but 
" gone before ;" that they are "praising God among the ransomed above," and 
therefore alive. The popular theory will not allow that a dead man is really 
dead. It teaches that he has merely changed a place of "temporal " for a place 
of eternal abode — that he has simply shifted out of the body from earth to 
heaven or to hell as the case may be ; it denies the possibility of death in 
relation to his essential being. In reality, therefore, the word "death," as 
popularly used, has lost its original meaning. It is no longer the antithesis of 
" life." It no longer means the cessation of living existence, which is its radical 
import, but simply signifies a change of habitation! "A man die? No, 
impossible! He may go out of the body, but he cannot die." This is 
popular sentiment — the dictum of the world's wisdom — the tenacious belief of 
the rehgious world. 

Now we would enquire as to the grcnind of this belief. Is there any statement 
in the Holy Scriptures to warrant it P — anything in the testimony of nature to 
countenance it ? No ; not only is" there an entire absence of testimony in its 



47 

favour, but great abundance of evidence to tlie contrary, showing tKat death 
invades a man's being and robs him of existence, and that consequently in 
death, he is totally unconscious as though he had never lived. The sequel will 
justify this answer. 

What is death ? It is the opposite of life. The idea of death is derived from 
experience of life, for death is the word that describes the interruption of life. 
In order, therefore, to understand death, we must have a definite conception of 
life. Of this we do know something, since it is a matter of positive experience. 
All we have to do is to bring our knowledge to bear, which the majority of 
people have great difficulty in doing. Their minds are so pre-occupied with 
established theories, that they are blind to the facts under their immediate 
cognizance. 

Throwing metaphysics aside, what is life as known experimentally ? It is 
the aggregate result of the organic processes transpiring within the human 
structure — in respiration, circulation of the blood, digestion, &;c. The lungs, 
the heart, and the stomach conspire to generate and sustain vitality, and to 
impart activity to the various faculties of which we are composed. Apart from 
this busy organism, life is unmanifested, whether as regards man or beast. 
Shock the brain, and insensibility ensues ; take away the air, and you produce 
suffocation ; cut off the supply of food, and death occurs. Could these effects 
be produced if life did not depend on the causes interfered with ? If life and 
function were the abstract a-ttributes of an immaterial element pervading the 
physical org^anization, would they not be manifested independently of material 
condition ? All positive as well as negative experience contributes to the 
same result, showing human life, with its mysterious phenomena of thought 
and feeling, to be the result of harmony in the working of the complicated 
machinery of which we are so "fearfully and wonderfully made." Thus we 
exist. There Tvas a time when we did not exist. This is most important, as 
showing the possibility of non-existence in relation to man ; for what has been, 
can be again. The question then is, shall this state of non-existence again 
supervene ? The answer is readily obtainable. Since human existence depends 
on material organic function, non-existence must ensue upon the interruption 
of that function. The whole matter is therefore reduced to a question of 
experience. By experience we know that this interruption does take place, and 
that man in consequence dies. Death comes to him and exactly undoes what 
birth did for him. The one gives him existence; the other takes it away. 
"Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return," is realized in every man's 
experience. In the course of nature, his being vanishes from creation, and all 
his qualities submerge in death, for the simple reason that the organism that 
develops them then stops its working. 



48 

Xow, Tvlien Tve look into the Scriptures, we find its teachings in complete 
accord Tvith this view of death. When they speak about the death of anybody, 
they do not employ the phraseology of modem religionists. They do not say 
cf the righteous that they have " gone to their reward," or, that they " winged 
their flight to a better world ;" or of the wicked, that they are '' gone to appear 
before the bar of God, to answer for their misdeeds." The language is simple 
and natural, and expressive of a contrary doctrine. If the death of Abraham, 
the father of the faithful, is recorded, there is no heaven-goiag rhapsody. The 
jhronicle is sober and literal : 

"And Abraham gave up the ghost, and died in a good old age, an old man, and fall 
of years, and was gathered to his people.'^ — Gen. xxv. 8. 

Such, also, is the description of Isaac's demise — 

" And Isaac gav6 up the ghost and died, and was gathered unto his people." — Gen. 
XXXV. 29. 

So of Jacob — 

"And when Jacob had made an end of commanding his sons, he gathered up his 
feet into the bed, and yielded up the ghost, and was gathered unto his people.'' — Gen. 
xlix. 33. 

Of Joseph it is simply said — 

" So Joseph died, being an hundred and ten years old ; and they embalmed him, and 
he was put in a co:ain in Egypt." — Gen. 1. 26. 

So in the case of Moses — 

" So Moses, the servant of the Lord, died there, in the land of Moab, according to 
the word of the Lord. And He buried him in a valley, in the land of Moab, over 
against Beth-peor, and no man knoweth of his sepulchre unto this day." — Deut. 
xxxiv. 5, 6. 

And so we shall find it in the case of Joshua (Joshua xxiv. 29), Samuel 
(1 Sam. XXV. 1), David (1 Kings ii. 1, 2, 10, Acts u. 29, 3-i), Solomon (1 Kings, 
xi. 43), and all others whose death is recorded in the Scriptures. They are 
never said to have gone away anywhere, but are always spoken of as dying in 
the absolute sense, giving up their life, and returning to the ground. The 
same style of language is adopted by Paul when spealdng of the generations of 
the righteous dead. He says (Heb. xi. 13) — 

"These all died in faith, not having received the peomises, but having seen 
them afar oj^." 

If we look at other parts of the Kew Testament, we discover the same 
peculiarity of language — the same utter absence of modem sentiment and phrase 
in regard to the state of the dead. If Jesus spake of the death of Lazarus, he 
recognized the fact in its plainest sense — (John xi. 11, 14}, 



I! 



J 



49 



" He (Jesus) saith unto fhem, Our friend Lazarus sleepeth ; but I go that I may 
awake him out of sleep. Then said his disciples, Lord, if he sleep, he shall do well. 
Howbeit Jesus spake of his death, but they thought he had'spoken of taking rest in 
sleep. Then saii Jesus unto them plainly, Lazarus is dead." 

Wten Luke records the death of Stephen (Acts vii. 60), he does not indulge 
Itt any of the high-flown death-bed rapture so prevalent in modem religious 
literature. He simply says — " He feU. asleep." Or when Paul has occasion to 
refer to deceased Christians, he does not speak of them as " standing before the 
tferone of Grod !" The words he employs are in keeping with those akeady 
quoted (1 Thess. iv. 13)— 

" I would not have you ignorant, brethren, concerniag them which are asleep, that 
ye sorrow not, even as others who have no hope." 

In short, all Bible allusion to the subject of death is as unlike modern sentiment 

as it is possible to conceive. The Bible speaks of death as the extinctioH of life^ 

and never as the commencement of another state. Not once does it tell us of a 

dead man having gone to heaven. Not once, except by an allowable poetical 

figure (Isaiah xiv. 4), are the dead represented as conscious. They are always 

pictured in language that accords with experience — always spoken of as in the 

land of darkness, and silence, and unconsciousness. Solomon says — 

•' Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might ; for thers -h noworlc, nor 
device, nor knowledge, nor wisdomiN the grave, whither thou goesty — Ecclesiastes ix. 10. 

Job, in the anguish of accumulated calamity, cursed the day of his birth, 
and wished he had died when an infant ; and mark what he says would have 
been the consequence : 

" For now I should have lain still and been quiet; I should have slept; then had I 
been at rest with the kings and counsellors of the earth, which built desolate places 
[tombs] for themselves ; or with princes that had gold, who filled their houses with 
BUver ; 07' as a hidden untimely birth I had not been, as infants which never saw the 
light; there the wicked cease from troubling, and there the weary are at rest. 
There the prisoners rest together; they hear not the voice of the oppressor ; the small 
and great are there, and the servant is free from his master." — Job iii. 13, 19. 

He also makes the following unequivocal statement, which ought to be well 
considered by those who believe that babies go to heaven when they die. 

(Chap. X. 18)—" Wherefore hast thou brought me forth out of the womb ? O, that I 
had given up the ghost, and no eye had seen me ; I should have heen as though I had 

NOT BEEN." 

David incidentally aUudes to the state of the dead in the following impressive 
words : — (Psahn Ixxxviii. 5, 10, 12) — 

" Free among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, %chom Thou remembcrcst 
no 7wor«j and they are cut off from Thy hand." 



50 

" Wilt Thou show wonders to the dead ? Shall the dead arise and praise Thee? 
Shall Thy loving-kindness be declared in the ^rare, or Thy faithfulness in destruction ? 
Shall Thy wonders be known in the dark, and thy righteousness in the land ol 
forgetfulness ?" * 

These questions are answered in a short but emphatic statement, which occurs 
in the 115th Psahn, verse 17 : — 

"The DEAD praise not the Lord, neither any that go down into silence.'* 

And the Psahnist gives pathetic expression to his own view of man's 

evanescent nature, in the following words, which have a direct bearing on the 

state of the dead : 

(Psa. xxxix. 5, 12, 13)— "Behold, thou hast made my days as an handbreadth, and 
mine age is as nothing before Thee. Verily, every man at his best state is altogether 
vanity. * * Hear my prayer, O Lord, and give ear unto my cry ; hold not Thy peace 
at my tears : for I am a stranger with Thee, and a sojourner, as all my fathers were. 
O, spare me, that I may recover strength before I go hence, suad be no mgee," 

He says, in Psalm cxlvi. 2, While I live I will praise the Lord, I will sing 
praises unto my God while I have any being;" clearly implying that in 
David's view, his being would cease with the occurrence of death. 

In addition to these general indications of the destructive nature of death as 
a deprivation of being, there are other statements in the Scriptures which 
specifically deny that the dead have any consciousness. For instance, Solomon 
says — 

" The living know that they shall die ; but the dead know not anything, neither 
have they any more a reward, for the memory of them is forgotten; also their love, 
and their hatred, and their ^nvrj are 7ioic perished, neither have they any more a 
portion for ever in anything that is done under the sun."--Ecclesiastes ix. 5, 6. 

How often we hear the remark concerning the dead, " Ah, weU ! He knows 

all now!" Now this remark is either true or not true. If Solomon's words 

have any meaning, it is the very opposite of true, for he says, " The dead hnaw 

not ANYTHING." How common, again, it is for religious teachers to say that 

after death, the dead will love and serve God with greater devotion in heaven, 

because freed from the clog of this mortal body; or curse him with more fiendish 

ferocity in heU, for the same reason; that, in fact, their love will be perfected, 

and their hate intensified ; in the very face of Solomon's declaration to the 

contrary: " Their Z^r^", and their hatred., and their 6'?ii'?/ are now pekeshed." 

David is equally decided on this point. He says (Psalm cxlvi. 3, 4) — 

" Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help ; 
for his breath goeth forth, lie, retumeth to his earth j in that very day his 
thoughts perish." 

Again, he says (Psahn vi. 5) — 

"In death THEEE IS NO EEMEiEBEANCE OF THEE: in the giave who Shall give thee 
thanks ?" 



51 

HezeMah, king of Israel, gives similar testimony. He had been '' sick, nigh 
unto death," and on his recovery, he indited a song of praise to God, in which 
he gives the following reason for thanksgiving : 

"For the grave cannot praise Thee, death cannot celebrate Thee, they that go down 
into the pit cannot hope for Thy truth. The a oiny, the living, he shall praise Thee 
as I do this day " — Isaiah xxxviii. 18, 19. 

This host of Scripture testimony is conclusive. It decisively settles the point 
against all philosophical speculation. It shows that death is a total eclipse of 
being — a complete obliteration of our conscious selves from G-od's universe, and 
thus establishes the doctrine of the resurrection (hitherto a sort of supernumerary 
in the system of received Christian doctrines), on the firm foundation of necessity; 
for in this view, a future life is only attainable by resurrection; whereas in the 
popular view, future life is a natural growth from the present, affected neither 
one way nor the other by the " resurrection of the body.'' In fact it is difficult 
to see any use for resurrection at all if we accept the popular idea ; for if a man 
" goes to his reward" at death, and enjoys all the felicity of heaven of which his 
nature is capable, it seems incongruous that, after a certain time, he should be 
compelled to leave the celestial regions, and rejoin his body on earth, when 
without that body he is supposed to have so much more capability of enjoyment. 
The thing "doesn't fit," as the common phrase goes. The resurrection seems 
out of place in such a system; and accordingly we find that, now-a-days, many 
are abandoning it, and vainly trying to explain away the New Testament 
doctrint of physical resurrection altogether, by inventing a theory of spiritual 
resuscitation, and twisting the plain statements of Scripture to accord with the 
new-bom conceit. Thus one error leads to a worse, and multiplies vanity in the 
mind of the people. Verily, the rehgious world is filled with vanities, whereof 
Cometh nothing ultimately but "vexation of spirit." 

We have cited many Scriptures in proof of the reality of death, and the 
consequent unconsciousness of those who are engulphed in its merciless jaws. 
Those Scriptures are not ambiguous. They are clear, plain, and intelligible. 
Now, suppose the positive declarations they make, were propounded in the form 
of interrogations, to any modem religious teacher, or to any of the intelligent 
among his flock, would their answers be at all in harmony with those declara- 
tions ? Let us see. Suppose we enquire. Do the dead know anything ? what 
would the answer be ? "0 yes, they know a great deal more than the li^dng." 
Or let us ask "When a man goes to the ground, do his thoughts perish F" 
The answer would instantly be, in the words of a "reverend" gentleman, in a 
recent funeral sermon, " O no, we rejoice to know that death, though it may 
close our mortal history, is not the termination of our existence — it is not even 
the suspension of consciousness.'^ Or again, Is there any remembrance of God 



52 

in death ? *' yes, the righteous dead know Him more perfectly, and love Him 
more fully than they did when on earth.'* Do the dead praise the Lord ? 
"Certainly; if they are redeemed ; they join in the song of Moses and the 
Lamb before the throne." Do babies that die pass away as though they had 
never been bom ? " No ! perish the thought ! They go to heaven, and become 
angels in the presence of God." 

Thus, in every instance, popular belief, in reference to the dead, is exactly 
contrary to the explicit statements of Scripture. That belief is entirely destitute 
of real foundation. It is opposed to all truth — natural and revealed. In the 
last lecture an endeavour was made to expose the fallacy of the " natural " 
arguments on which it is founded. In this it is proposed to look at a few of 
the Scriptural reasons that are generally put forward in its behalf. Those 
reasons are based upon certain passages that occur mostly in the New Testa- 
ment ; and although they do bear on the face of them some apparent 
countenance to popular belief, it has to be remarked that not one of them affirms 
that belief. The evidence they are supposed to contain is purely inferential. 
That is, they make certain statements which are supposed to imply the doctrine 
sought to be proved, but they do not proclaim the doctrine itself. Now, it is 
important to note this general fact to commence with. It is something to know 
that there is not a single ptromise of heaven at death^ in the whole Bihle^ and 
not a single declaration that man, has an immortal, thinking soul within him; 
and that all the supposed evidence contained in the Bible in favour of these 
doct7'ines, is so decidedly ambiguous, as to be open to disputation as to its 
meaning. It is important, because the testimony in favour of the opposite view, 
(the one set forth in the present lecture) is so clear and explicit, as to defy 
misconstruction, without the grossest violation of the fundamental laws of 
langniage. This consideration suggests an important principle of Scriptural 
interpretation, viz., iha^i plain testimony ought to guide us in the understanding 
of what may be obscure. "We ought to procure our fundamental principles 
from teaching that cannot be impugned, and harmonise all difficulties therewith. 
It is unwise to found a dogma on a passage, which from its vagueness, is sus- 
ceptible of two interpretations, especially if that dogma is in opposition to the 
unmistakable declarations of the "Word of God elsewhere. 

Let us for a moment apply this principle to the Scriptures cited by those who 
set themselves to justify the popular theory. 

The first is the answer of Christ to the thief on the cross, " To-day shalt 
thou be with me in paradise " — (Luke xxiii. 43). This is thought to estabHsh 
the common idea at once ; but let us see. The pith of the argument turns upon 
the date of its fulfilment. Does seemeron (the Greek word translated "to-day") 
in this instance, mean the day of twenty-four hours upon which the words 



53 

were spoken ? TMs is impossible, for the simple reason that the promise so 
understood was not fulfilled. Jesus was not in paradise in the popular sense, 
that day ; for we find him saying to Mary after his resurrection, " Touch me^ 
not, for I AM NOT YET ASCENDED TO MY Fathee " — (John XX. 17). Jesus was 
not in heaven during at least three days after his promise to the thief 
Where had he been ? The answer is in the grave : ay, but his soul, asks one, 
where had it been ? Let Peter answer (Acts M. 31), " His soul was not left in 
hell, neither did his flesh see corruption." Clearly then, Christ's " soul " was 
not in the paradise of popular beHef, nor a paradise of any kind, during the 
temporary victory of death over him. He, or ^'his soul," which is equivalent 
to "himself," was in the grave, or "hell," (for the words are in most cases 
synonymous in Scriptural use,) awaiting the interference of the Father from 
above, to deliver him from the bonds of death. The conclusion is, that Christ's 
promise to the thief is of no avail whatever as a proof of the heaven-going 
consciousness of the dead, inasmuch as it was not fulfilled in the sense in which 
we require to view it, before it can constitute such proof. Has it been fulfilled 
at all ? "N'o ! Let us consider the question of the thief. It is quite clear that 
he did not anticipate any going to heaven. He did not say, "Lord, remember 
me, now that thou art about to go into thy kingdom," but " Lord, remember 
me, when thon comest into thy kingdom." He had a coming in his eye — ^not a 
going ; and he looked upon it as a future event, and his desire was to be 
remembered when that future event should be accomplished — "when thou comest 
into thy kingdom." "We shall say something about this "coming " hereafter. 
Meanwhile it is sufficient to direct attention to the general fact, as furnishing 
a clue to the meaning of Christ's answer. What was that answer? " Seemeron, 
thou shalt be with me in paradise." Kow this word seemeron is very emphatic 
in its meaning. It calls attention to some particular day or time tinder consid- 
eration, as distinct from day in a general sense. Now the question is, to what 
special day would it refer in the mouth of Christ, while answering the very 
pointed request of the thief ? Obviously to the day spoken of — the day when 
he should come into his hingdom; so that the answer accommodated to the English 
idiom, would read " Verily, I say unto thee, in that day thou shalt be with me 
in paradise." This rendering is adopted in a recent translation of the New 
Testament, published by the American Union. Whether the answer amounted 
to a promise of salvation, is a matter of doubt. Many will be in paradise when 
Jesus comes in his kingdom, only to be ignominiously expelled from the presence 
of the Eang. Whether the thief will be among this number or not, the day 
wiU declare. The Judge of all the earth will do right. 

The account of the rich man and Lazarus (Luke xvi. 19-31) is the principal 
stronghold of the popular belief. It is brought forward with great confidence 



I 



on every occasion on which the popular belief is assailed. A little consideration, 
however, will reveal its inapplicability to the purpose for which it is used. The 
portion of Scripture in question, is either a literal narrative or a parable. If 
literal, it upsets the belief it is quoted to prove, because it is the tradition of 
the Pharisees that forms the basis of the parable : a tradition which clashes 
with the popular theory of the death-state in many particulars, as may be seen 
by noting that this very parable is, in many of its incidents, incompatible with 
popular theory. The rich man lifts up his eyes, being in torment, and sees 
Abraham afar off^ and Lazarus in his bosom ; " and cries "Father Abraham, 
have mercy on me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip nf his finger in 
water to cool my tongue^ Does the popular theory admit of the wicked in hell 
seeing the righteous in heaven ? or contemplate the possibility of conversation 
passing between the occupants of the two places ? And has the popular 
immortal soul finger-tips, tongue, and other material members, on which water 
would have a material cooling effect ? Abraham denied the rich man's request, 
addiiig as a supplementary reason, " Between you and us there is a great gulph 
fixed, so that they which would pass from hence to you cannot." (Is a "gulph" 
any obstacle to the transit of an immaterial soul ?) The rich man asked 
Abraham to send Lazarus to his five brethren, to testify to them lest they should 
come to the same place of torment ; Abraham answered, " If they hear not 
Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one eose feom 
THE DEAD." (According to the popular view, would a rising from the dead 
have been necessary, when a spirit commissioned from "the vasty deep" would 
have been sufficient to communicate the warning necessary in the circumstances ?) 
The whole narrative has an air of tangibility about it, which does not comport 
with the common view of the state of the dead. Besides, what an incongruity 
to think of heaven and hell being within sight of each other, and of conversation 
passing between them ! Yet, if we insist upon the story as a literal narrative, 
we are committed to aU these particulars, which are so thoroughly at variance 
with the popular theory. But is it a literal narrative ? Not at all. The 
majority even of orthodox believers will admit that it is a parable. It has 
nothing to do with the question in dispute one way or other. It was addressed to 
the Pharisees to enforce the lesson that in due time the mighty and rich would be 
brought down, and the poor exalted ; and that if men would not be led by the 
testimony of Moses and the prophets, miracles, (even the raising of the dead) 
would fail to move them. The parable has no reference to the death-state theory, 
whose literal outlines it reflects ; it bears entirely on the subject for which it 
was used. Like all parables, it teaches something else than itself, else it were 
no parable. But it may be urged that this parable. Like all other parables, has 
its foundation ia fact. So it has in a ceftain way. The death-state theory 



55 

whicli it embodies was the heliefoftha Pharisees, to whom Christ was address-' 
ing himself . This is apparent from the treatise on ''Hades," by Josephus 
(himseK a Pharisee), which will be found at the close of his compiled works, 
and in which the reader will find a recognition of the existence of "Abraham's 
"bosom," and the fiery lake in "an unfinished paet of the woeld." He will 
find the belief of the Pharisees (reflected in the parable of Jesus) a very different 
thing from popular belief in heaven beyond the skies, and hell as an abyss in 
the black and dizzy parts of the universe. A perusal of it will convince him of 
the wide dissimilarity of the Jewish theory embodied in the parable of the rich 
man and Lazarus, from the commonly received doctrine of going to heaven and 
heU. The parable was founded on a theoretical fact ; but, it may be asked, Why 
did Christ parabolicaUy employ a belief that was fictitious, and thus give it his 
apparent sanction ? "We answer, that Christ was not using it with any reference 
to itself, but for the purpose of being able to introduce a dead man's testimony. 
He wanted to impress upon them the lesson conveyed in the concluding words of 
Abraham, " If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be per- 
suaded though one rose from the dead ; " and in no more forcible way could he 
have done this, than by framing a parable based upon their own theory of the 
death-state, which admitted of the conciousness of the dead, and therefore their 
capability to speak on the subject he wanted to introduce. This did not involve 
his sanction of the theory, any more than he approved unfaithfulness, by intro- 
ducing it into his parable of the ungrateful steward in the same chapter. When 
Christ had occasion to speak plainly, and for himself, of the dead, his words were in 
accordance with the truth. Witness the case of Lazarus; "then said he unto 
Xh-QTo. plainly (indicating that 'asleep' is not 'plain' and literal), Lazarus is 
dead" (Jno. xi. 25) ; "He that beHeveth on me, though he were dead^ yet shall 
he Hve," that is, by resurrection, for he had said just before, "I am THE 
EESUEEECTIOlSr and the life;" "The hour is coming in wHch all that 
ABE IN THE GEAYE shall hear his voice and come forth; they that have done 
good to the resurrection of life^ and they that have done evil to the 
resurrection of condemnation'^ (Jno. v. 29). It is in these plain words of Christ 
that we are to seek for Christ's real idea on the subject of the dead, and not in a 
parabolic discourse, which was intended for a purpose separate from itself. How 
strange, that so important a doctrine as the heaven- and-hell consciousness of the 
dead should have to depend upon a parable ! and if it be insisted that the parable 
in question proves the point contended for, what are we to do with aU the 
testimony already advanced to the contrary? Are we to make a parable 
paramount, and throw away plain testimony ? Are we to twist and violate what 
is clear to make it agree with what we think is meant by that which is admit- 
tedly obscure ? Is not the opposite rather the course of true wisdom, detormiiiing 



56 

and solving that wMcli is uncertain by that which is unmistakable ? It may be 
urged that it was unlike Christ to perpetuate delusion, and withhold the truth 
on such an important question as that involved in the parable used. To this,! 
the reply will be found in the following — 

"And the disciples came and said unto him, Why speakest thou to them in parables} 
He answered and said unto them, Because it is given you to know the mysteries 
of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given. For whosoever hath, to him 
shall be given, and he shall have more abundance ; but whosoever hath not, from 
him shall be talaen away even that which he hath. Therefore speak I to them in 
parables, because seeing, they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they under- 
stand.'^ — Hatt. xiii. 10,-13. 

The next Scriptural argument in favour of the popular theory is generally 
advanced with an air of great confidence. "Did'nt John, in the Isle of Patmos,' 
says the triumphant questioner, " see the redeemed of every kindred, and 
tongue, and people, and nation, standing before the throne of God, and giving 
glory? Who are these, if the righteous don't go to heaven at death?" Stay, 
friend ; turn to the first verse of the 4th chapter of Hevelations, and see what 
you find there. *'I heard a voice as it wer-e of a trumpet talking with me, 
which said, Come up hither, and I wiU show thee things which jmust bb 
HEEEAFTEE." Here is an answer to the question. The sights which John 
subsequently witnessed were only representations of things which were to be 
at a futuri lime^ and therefore when he saw a great multitude praising God, ho 
beheld the assembly of the resurrected as they will appear at the second advent, 
Stephen's dying prayer, — (Acts vii. 59.) — "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit," is 
generally cited as another proof of the doctrine. The answer to this is that 
Stephen's pfneuma^ spirit or breath, was not himself \ it was merely the 
principle or agency that gave him life, as it gives all other men and animals 
life. This principle does not constitute the man or the animal. It is necessary 
to give them existence, but it does not belong to them, except during the short 
term of their existence. Stephen's spirit was not Stephen. It was God's, and' 
proceeds from Him. Thus we read in Job xxxiii. 4, " The spirit of God hath 
made me, and the breath of the Almighty hath given me life." Hence it is said 
(Job xxxiv. 14, 15,) — " If He (God) set His heart upon man — if He gather unto 
himself HIS spirit, and HIS breath — all flesh shall jjerish together, and man shall 
turn again unto dust.'' Yet the spirit is indispensable to constitute a man in 
conjunction with his bodily organism. When this life principle, emanating 
from God, is withdrawn, it reverts to its original proprietorship, and the 
created being disappears. This is the idea expressed in Solomon's words 
(Ecclesiastes xii. 7), "Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was, and 
the spirit shall retmm to God who gave it." Stephen, however, looked 
forward to a renewing of life at the resurrection. This was his hope. He 



57 

hoped to get his life hack. Consequently, whem he came to die, he confided it 
to the keeping of the Saviour till that day, and as the narrative adds, ^^ He 
fell asleep.'' 

We next come to the words of Paul in 2 Corinthians v. 8, — "We are confident, 
I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body, and to be present with 
the Lord." This is supposed to countenance the popular idea; but let us 
consider it. What "absence from the body" was it that Paul desired? Not 
disembodiment, for he says in verse 4, of the same chapter, '•^Not that we 
would be unclothed, but clothed upon {with our house which is from heaven), 
that MORTALITY might he swallowed up of life,'' What Paul desired was 
freedom from the cumbrance of an imperfect sinful body, and possession of the 
incorruptible body of the resurrection, for, says he (v. 4) — 

We that are in this tabernacle do groan, being burdened, (v. 2,) earnestly 
desiring to be clothed upon ivith que house which is from heaven." 

Or, as he expresses it in Romans viii. 23, 

" We ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for ihe adoption, to wit, the eedemp- 

TION OF OUR BODY." 

Now when does this redemption take place ? Not at death. The body then 
goes to the ground in corruption ; not till the resurrection at the coming of 
the Lord, is it raised to incorruption. Not till then does "presence with the 
Lord" take place. The testimony is — 

"The Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the 
archangel, and with the trump of God : and the dead in Christ shall rise first : then we 
who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to 
meet the Lord in the air, and so shall we ever be with the Lord."—l Thess. iv. 16, 17. 

This "absence from the (corruptible) body" is synonymous, in the passage 
quoted, with "presence with the Lord," since flesh and blood will, in the case 
of the accepted, then be merged in the spirit-nature with which the saints are 
to be invested. Says Paul, "Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of 
God." — (1 Cor. XV. 50.) This being the case, he might well desire to be absent 
from flesh and blood, and might at the same time well add his desire to be 
present with the Lord ; for all who are absent from the body will not attain to 
the honour of incorruptible existence in his presence. Many will be absent 
from the body for all eternity, and nothing else ; that is, they will be without 
body — without existence — swallowed up in the second death. 

The 23rd verse of the first chapter of Philippians is another portion of 
•Scripture which is repeatedly quoted in support of the popular idea of heaven - 
going. — "I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to de})art and to be with 



58 



11 



Christ, which is far better." In reality, however, this does not contain the-1 
proof which it seems to bear upon its face. Paul, of course, did not pen the 
words in question. He wrote in Greek, and therefore in case of dispute, we 
must refer to the tongue in which he expressed his ideas, before we can arrive 
at his exact meaning. The difficulty hinges upon the word translated "to 
depart." The word is analusai, is the aorist infinitive of the verb analuo^ which 
is a compound of ana, again, and lno, to loose. "Hence," says Parkhurst, "it 
signifies in the New Testament to return or departs It is used in the former 
sense in Luke xii. 36, where we read, "Be like unto men who wait for their 
Lord, when he will (analusei) return from the wedding." There is thus a 
choice between two renderings, each compatible with the original text. Which 
is to be adopted ? Obviously the one which accords with the teaching of the 
New Testament. On this principle, the choice must fall on return, as express- 
ing the true import of the word u^ed by Paul in this text. But it may be 
said, this does not alter the significance of Paul's statement, since to return and 
be with Christ, is similar ia its import to "depart and be with Christ.'' Veryi 
true, if the infinite form of the verb be retained; but it so happens that the 
introduction of the infinitive into the English rendering is a grammatical 
error, which no one understanding such matters will for a moment defend. 
The infinitive, in the original analusai, to return, is preceded by the article 
"2^0" and the rule in this case is as follows: "The infinitive, rvith the article, is 
in all cases EamvALENT to a substantive; as ton legeo, the act of speaking.'* 
Hence to analusai (literally "the to return") is only properly rendered by 
"the returning" and '^enaV by "the being;" and as these phrases are preceded 
by the preposition "^i^" (foi^J it foUows that Paul's desire was "for tb 
returning and the being with Christ." The verse then translated in strict 
accordance with the original, would stand as foUows: — 

"For I am straitened by the two, having the earnest desire for the returning and 
the being with Christy far better by much." 

Here we have a "returning" as the object of Paul's desire in preference to 
continuance in mortal life. Paul connects this returning with his being with 
Christ; therefore, we shall have no difficulty in identifying that "returning 
2tB the coming or rtturniiig of the Lord Jems Christ from heaven; because 
Paul invariably points to that event as the time of being made present with 
Christ. For instance, in 1 Thess. iv. 17, after describing the coming of Christ, 
the resurrection of the dead, and the transformation of the living, he says "So 
shall we ever be ri^ith the Lord'' Again, in 2 Corinth, iv. 14, he says "He 
that raised up the Lord Jesus shall raise vp us also by Jesus, and shall present 
us WITH YOU." Again, John says, (1st Epistle ui. 2), " When he shall appear,^ 



It 



59 

•we shall be like Mm; for we shall see him as he is." For this reason Paul 
tells us in the very epistle in which the disputed words are found, that he was 
striving "if by any means he might attain to tlie resurrection of the dead.'' — 
(chap. iii. 11.) In no case does he speak of presence with the Lord occurring 
prior to that event. Assuming this to be settled, we have to harmonize the 
view advocated with the necessity of the context. Paul was speaking of life 
and death, and of the difficulty he had in deciding in his own mind which was 
the preferable in his case ; and the question which will instantly arise in the 
objector's mind, in view of the rendering of Paul's words just advocated, is — 
How could Paul associate his death with his desire for the coming of Christ, 
when the latter event was to take place many centuries after ? The answer is, 
because to him, in death, there would be no conscious lapse of time. The 
moment of death and the moment of resurrection would be to him consecutiva 
The interval would pass Hke a flash of lightning. Assuming that Paul enter- 
tained this view, he could with all appropriateness look upon his decease as 
equivalent to the returning of the Lord, as it would bring the event instan- 
taneously to his door, so far as his consciousness was concerned. If it be asked in 
what sense death would be "gain" to Paul, the answer is furnished in the words 
of Christ: "He that loseth his life for my sake, the same shaU find it." Paul 
was about to be beheaded ; this was the death he refers to in the context. 
Again, "Be thou faithful unto death, and / will give thee a crown of life ^ 
When? Turn to 2 Timothy iv. 8, "Henceforth there is laid up forme a crown of 
righteousness, which the Lord the righteous Judge shall give me at that day, 
(Christ's appearing and kingdom, see 1st verse), and not to me only^ hut unto 
ALL THEM also that love his appearing." It was "gain." to die, also, because 
Paul would thus be freed from all the privations and persecutions enumerated 
in 2 Cor. xi. 23, 28, and would peaceably "sleep" in Christ. 

Before passing on, we shall consider the further argniments advanced on 
scriptural grounds in favour of the immortality of the soul, and a disembodied 
state of existence. 

That on the theory advocated in these leetufes, Christ'' s sacrifice was to 
procure that which God, with equal jtistice, could have given without any such 
sacrifice at all. — Tiiis argument evinces a misunderstanding of the first principles 
of both Old and New Testament teaching, as apprehended from the stand- 
point of the lectures. To place these in a clear Light, the following remarks are 
necessary. Death is the fixed and unvarying penalty of sin. Sin is disobedience 
or transgression of divine law ; and the perpetrator of it, placing himself out 
of joint with the springs of harmony — moral and physical — that have their 
centre in God, is disqualified for fulfilling the object of his being, either as 
regards himself, others, or God. Misery is the ine\dtable result of such a 



60 



-the] I 



condition; and if is one of the beneficent ordinances of the universe 
enactment of the divine will — that inunortality shall be impossible where such 
a condition exists — that death, extinction of being, shall follow in the train of 
moral pestilence, and wipe its evil results from the face of creation. Now this 
principle has been brought into operation in relation to the human race 
on the federal principle. That is, God dealt with the human race, as a 
whole, through its first member and representative. Adam was placed under 
law and disobeyed, and was thereupon sentenced to return to the ground from 
which he was taken : that is, to pass a^ay into his original nothingness. Adam 
was thus constituted mortal under the merciful law that "the wages of sin is 
death," and we, as inheritors of his being, come under the operation of the law 
set in motion upon him, and stand related to the same decree of dissolution- 
To Adam's sin we add our own, and thereby rivet the chains of mortality 
around our necks beyond all hope of redemption. How then can it be possible 
for God to confer immortality on men without the sacrifice of Christ ? It was 
necessary that the law under which we were condemned should have its full 
effect on the condenmed nature. Its full effect on us would have sent us into 
an eternal grave ; but in the benevolence of God, an arrangement has been 
made, under which a way has been legally opened for the escape of condenmed 
human nature. This was secured by Christ, "being made of a woman," (Gal. iv. 4) 
and a partaker of "flesh and blood," (Heh. ii. 14) and sent forth in "the like- 
ness of sinful flesh" (Rom. viii. 3.) In this sinful flesh, or condemned nature,^ 
he died, and had he been a sinner himseK, his death would have been as final 
and irretrievable as ours; but he was "holy, harmless and undefiled — without 
sin;" and therefore, though prevailed over by death, "it was not possible that 
he should be holden of it." — (Acts ii. 24.) His resurrection was the logical 
sequel. He rose again, as a member of the human family, to die no more, and 
as a second Adam, he is in a position (on the same federal principle observed in 
the case of the first Adam) to admit to participation in his freedom and life, aU 
men who believe, and obey, and love him. 

" There is no ^j'eac-e, saith the Lord, unto the n'icked.'' — This is absolutely 
true, irrespective of any theory that may be held as to the destiny of the 
wicked. While the wicked are in existence, either in this life or after resurrec- 
tion, there is no peace for them. It is impossible there could be peace for them, 
especially looking forward to the time when they shall be the objects of God's 
judicial and all-devouring vengeance. But this does not prove (as it is quoted 
to prove) that they are immortal. Such an idea is utterly precluded by the 
testimonies quoted toward the close of this lecture. 

The appearance of Moses and Elias on the Mount of Transfiguration. — (Matt, 
xvii. 3.) As regards Elias, it is testified that he did not see death, but was 



I 



61 

translated. — (2 Kings ii. 11.) His appearance would, therefore, be no proof of 
the existence of disembodied spirits. As to Moses, if he were bodily present, 
as Elias may be presumed to have been, he must have been raised from the 
dead before hand ; and that he was bodily apparent is evident, from the fact of 
the disciples — mortal men — seeing and recognising him. But it is quite an 
open question whether either Moses or Elias were actually present. The 
testimony is that the things seen were "a vision." — (Matt. xvii. 9.) ISTow from 
Acts xii. 9, we learn that a vision is the opposite of a reality — that is something 
seen after the manner of a dream — a something apparently real, but in reality 
existing only in the sensorium of the dreamer. The audibility of the voices 
settles nothing one way or other, because in vision, as in a dream, voices may 
be heard that have no existence, except in the aural nerves of the seer. In 
dream, the illusion is the result of functional disorder; in vision, it is the result 
of the will-energy of the Deity, acting upon the hearing organization of the 
trance-wrapt seer (^"i^^ Acts x. 13; also the song of the Apocalyptic living 
creatures, and the voice of "souls under the altar.") Neither does the presence 
of Jesus (an actual personage) as one of the three, contribute much to a solution, 
because there would be no anomaly in causing Moses and Elias to visionally 
appear to Jesus, and in association with Jesus. It is probable Moses and 
Elias were really present, but the use of the word "vision" unhinges the 
matter a little. In no case can the transfiguration be construed into a proof of 
the immortality of the soul. Tt was doubtless a pictorial illustration of the 
kingdom, in so far as it represented Jesus in his consummated power and 
glory, exalted over the law (represented by Moses) and the prophets (represent- 
ed by Elijah) and therefore elevated to the position to which the prophets 
point forward, when as the head of the nation of Israel and the whole earth, he 
will cause to be fulfilled the prediction of Moses and the command of the 
heavenly voice : "Him shall ye hear in all things;" "Hear ye him." 

" God is not the God of the dead, but of the living" (Matt. xxii. 32.) 
If the orthodox believer took a logical view of tliis statement, he would perceive 
that instead of proving the immortality of the soul, it indirectly establishes 
the contrary. It recognises the existence of a class of human beings who are 
not "Hving," but "dead." "Who are they? According to the popular theory, 
there are "no dead" in relation to the human race at all; every human being 
lives for ever. It cannot be suggested that it means '^dead'' in the moral 
sense, because this is expressly excluded by the subject of which Jesus is 
speaking — the resurrection of dead bodies from the ground {v. 31). The 
Sadducees denied the resurrection; Jesus proved the resurrection by quoting 
from Moses the words of Jehovah, "I am the God of Aleraham, the God of 
Isaac, and the God of Jacob." How did Jesus deduce the resuiTCction from 



62 

this formula ? By maintaining that God was not the God of those who were 
dead in the sense of being done with. (See Psahn xlix. 19, 20.) From God 
caviling himself the God of three men who were dead, Jesus argued that God 
intended to raise them; for "God calleth those things which be not (but are 
to be) AS THOUGH THEY WEEE." — (Rom. iv. 17). The Sadducees saw the 
point of the argument, and were put to silence. But if, as is usually contended, 
the meaning' of '^God is not the God of the dead, but of the living,'' be, 
that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are alive, Christ's argument for the resurrec- 
tion of the dead is destroyed. To assert that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were 
alive, would be a curious way of proving that God intended to make them alive ! 

" Their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven.'' — 
(Matt, xviii. 10.) "Whose angels? the angels of "the Little ones which believe" 
(Matt, xviii. 6.) It is customary to synonymise "spirits" with "angels," and to 
make it out that "their angels" means the "little ones" themselves; but this is a 
liberty so entirely at variance both with the sense and philology of the case, as 
to be undeserving of reply. The "little ones" are those who "receive the 
kingdom of God as a Little child," and "their angels" are the angels of God 
who supervise their interests. "The angel of the Lord encampeth round about 
them that fear him" (Psalm xxxiv. 7). "Are they (the angels) not all 
ministering spirits sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of 
salvation?" (Heb. i. 14.) Tliis fact is a good reason why we should "take 
heed that we despise not one of these little ones;" but adopt the popular 
version of the matter, and the reason vanishes. "Take heed that ye despise 
not one of these httle ones, for their redeemed spirits are in heaven." This 
would involve a paradox. Yet without it, the proof for immortal-soulism 
which some see in it, is nowhere to be found. 

" Jn the way of righteousness is life, and in the pathway thereof is -so -dbatk." 
(Prov. xii. 28.) This is sometimes quoted to prove that as regards the right- 
eou.s at any rate, there is no such thing as even momentary extinction of being. 
If the passage prove this, we claim that the converse be admitted as established 
also, that in the way of umigliteousness is death, and in the pathway thereof 
KG LIFE. The terms of an affirmative proposition have the same value in a 
negative. Hence, if this passage prove the literal immortality of the right- 
eous, it proves the literal mortality of the wicked, which is more than those 
who use this argument are prepared to accept. The passage bears out the 
proposition that the Bible is against the doctrine of the immortality of the soul. 

^'Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul." — (Matt. 
X. 28.) Tliis is the orthodox advocate's great triumph. He feels here he has 
some little foothold, and he recites the passage with an emphasis entirely 
absent from his other efforts, but he generally snatches his triumph too early. 



63 

He begins comment before finishing the verse. He exultantly enquires why 
this passage has not been quoted, and so on, and then stumbles over the concluding 
sentence ''''but rather fear Hlin that is able to destroy both soul and dody 
in hell.'" Instantly perceivmg the disaster which this elaboration of Christ's 
exhortation brings upon his theory of imperishable and immortal-soulism, he 
suggests that "destroy" in this instance means "afflict," "torment." It is 
necessary to make this suggestion in order to save himself from utter discomfi- 
ture ; but a more unwarrantable suggestion was never hazarded by a theorist 
in straits. In all the instances in which apollumi — the word translated 
"destroy," is used, it is impossible to discover the slightest approach to the 
idea of aifiiction or torment. We append all the New Testament instances in 
which it is used : — "The young child to ^65^r^?/ him" (Matt. ii. 13); "might 
de^troij l-mn.'" (Matt. xii. 14; Mark iii. 6; xi. 18); "WiU miserably destroy 
those wicked men" (Matt. xxi. 41); ^'Destroyed those murderers" (Matt. xxii. 
7); "Persuaded the multitude that they should ask Barabbas and destroy 
Jesus" (Matt, xxvii. 20); "Art thou come to destroy'' (Mark i. 24; Luke iv. 
34); "Into the waters to destroy him" (Mark ix. 22); "and destroy the 
husbandmen" (Mark xii. 9; Luke xx. 16) ; "To save life or destroy " (Luke vi. 
9); "Not come to <^(95tr^?/ men's lives" (Luke ix. 56); "The flood came and 
destroyed ^QTn^A.'' (Luke xvii. 27, 29); "Of the people sought to destroy 
him" (Luke xix. 47); "To steal, and to kiU, and to destroy'' (Luke x. 10); 
'•^Destroy not with thy meat" (Rom. xiv. 15); "I wiU destroy the wisdom of 
the wise" (1 Cor. i. 19); "Were destroyed of serpents" (1 Cor. x. 9); "And 
were destroyed of the destroyer" (1 Cor. x. 10) ; " Cast down but not destroyed " 
(2 Cor. iv. 9); "Is able to save and to destroy (Jas. iv. 12); "Afterwards 
destroyed them that believed not" (Jude 5). In all these cases, "destroy" has 
a very different meaning from "a:Sict" or "torment." The reader has only to 
substitute either of these words for "destroy" in any of the passages, to see 
how utterly out of place such a paraphrase of the word would be. If " destroy " 
in every other case has its natural meaning, why should an exceptional meaning 
be claimed for it in Matthew x ? No reason can be given beyond the one already 
hinted at, viz. the necessities of the orthodox behever's theory. This is no 
sound reason at all, and therefore we put it aside, and enquire what Jesus 
meant by exhorting his disciples to " Fear not them that kill the body, but 
are not able to kill the soul ; but fear him that can destroy both soul and body 
in hell." We reply, there is a life in relation to those who are Christ's, which 
cannot be touched by mortal man, however they may treat the body and the 
poor mortal life belonging to it. This life, Paul says, " is hid with Cheist 
IN God" (Col. iii. 3), and wJien Christy who is our life, shall appea7\ then 
ehaU we appear with him in glory" (v. 4). This life is the '^treasure In the 



64 

heavens whicli faileth not," spoken of by Jesus, and said by Peter to be 
'•reserved in heaven." Now when men kill the saints, they only terminate 
their mortal existence. They do not touch that real life of theirs^ which is 
related to the eternal future, and which has its foundation in their connection 
with Christ in the heavens. This is in Christ's keeping, and can be touched by 
no man. We are not to fear thoee who can only demolish the corruptible 
body, and cannot do anything to prevent the coming bestowal of immortality 
by resurrection. "We are to fear Him who hath power to desteoy both body 
AXD SOUL (life) in Gehenna ; that is, in the coming retribution by destructive 
fire-manifestation, which will utterly consume the ungodly from the presence 
of the Lord. TVe are to fear G-od who has the power to annihilate from the 
universe, and who will use the power on all such as are unworthy. "VVe are not 
to fear those who can at best only hasten the dissolution to which we are 
Adamically liable. 



Eeeoneousxess of Populae Belief in Heaven and Hell. 

This follows as a conclusion from the premisses already established. If the 
dead are really dead — in the absolute sense contended for in this lecture — of 
course they cannot have gone to any state of reward or punishment, because 
they are not alive to go. This follows inevitably ; but we are not content to 
leave the matter in this inferential position. "We desire to show La a positive 
way, from the Scriptures, that the belief in question is not only erroneous in 
supposing that the dead go to such places as the popular heaven or helL 
immediately after deaths but, in thinking that they ever go there at all at any 
time. 

Let us consider what the place of final reward is^ according to the religious 
teaching of the present day. It is a region beyond the stars — remote from the 
farthest limit of God's imiverse "beyond the realms of time and space" — the 
place where the Creator is supposed to be enthroned amid dazzling glories, 
and surrounded by countless millions of angels and redeemed souls. The 
inhabitants of this region are generally represented as singing a perpetual 
song of praise, standing before the throne through all the years of the Eternal. 
This is the occupation to which the righteous are appointed by popular 
theology. "When the grim enemy invades the last domain of life on earth, the 
liberated soul is conveyed with inconceivable rapidity to the realms above, and 
friends bereaved console themselves with the idea that they are " not lost but 
gone before." They think of them as better off in that "happy land, far, far 
away," than they were in this vale of tears; and no doubt, if it were true, the 
reflection would be a comforting one ] but whether true or not; it must strike 



65 

every reflecting mind as an exceedingly discordant element in the case that 
the righteous after enjoying so many years of celestial felicity, should have to 
be arraigned in judgment at "the last day" to answer for the deeds done in 
the body. Oiie would naturally suppose that their admission into heaven in 
the first instance was the proof of their fitness and acceptance. Why, then, the 
trial afterwards? Judgment in such a case seems a mockery. The same 
remark applies to those who are supposed to have gone to the place of woe. 

This going to heaven, however, is a purely gratuitous speculation. There is 
nat a single promise throughout the whole of the Scriptures to warrant a man 
in hoping for this kind of salvation. There are, no doubt, recurring phrases . 
in the Nefw Testament which, to a mind previously indoctrinated with the idea, 
seem to afford countenance to it, such for instance as that used by Peter (1st 
Epistle, 1st chap. v. 4) : "An inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that 
fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you;" of which we have an illustration 
in the words of Christ (Matt. v. 12): "For great is your reward in heaven;'' 
and more particularly in his exhortation to "Lay up for yourselves treasures 
i7i heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not 
break through nor steal." But these phrases are only to be properly under- 
stood by those who have a comprehension of the truth as a whole. They 
express an aspect of the Christian hope, viz. : its present aspect. God's salvation 
is not now on earth ; indeed it is not yet an accomplished fact anywhere. It 
merely exists in the Divine mind as a jjurpose, and in detail, that purpose is 
specially related to those whom Jehovah foreknowingly contemplates as the 
^' saved," who are said to be "written in the book," that is, inscribed on the 
"book of \n.^ remembrance'' — (Malachi iii. 16). Therefore, if future reward 
can be said to be located anywhere at present, it is in heaven, to which the eye 
instinctively turns as the source of its promised manifestation. Moreover, 
Jesus, who is the pledge of that reward, yea, the very germ thereof, is i\ 
heaven, so that in a special sense may the undefiled inheritance be said a,t 
present to be there; for it exists there in purpose, in guarantee, and in gern.v, 
and has no existence of any kind anywhere else ; but it is only there in "reserve ;" 
and we shall see in future lectures that it is not bestowed upon any until its 
manifestation at "the appearing of our Lord and Sa^vdour Jesus Christ," of 
whom it is said that "i^is Reward is Ymn him" — (Rev. xxii. 12; Isaiah xl. 
10), The phrases in question indicate in a general way that "Salvation comcth 
from the Lord ;" and the Lord being in hea^ven, it cometh from heaven, mid 
being yet luimanif ested, can properly be said to be at i)i'esent in heaven ; but 
on the specific question under consideration, the evidence is conclusive, as 
shomng that no son of Adam's race shall ever enter the holy and inaccessible 
X)reoi^icts of the residence of Deity. "God dwelleth in light which no man can 



66 

approach vnio " — (1 Tim. ri. 16). And the emphatic declaration of Christ is, 
*" IS man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, 
even the Son of Man who is in heaven" — (John iii. 13). Agreeably to this 
declaration of Clirist, we have no record in the Scriptures of anyone ha\ing 
entered heaven. Elijah was removed from the earth; so was Enoch; but 
Christ's statement forbids us to suppose that they were conducted to "the 
heaven of heavens" which "belong to the Lord." The statement that they 
went "into heaven" does not necessarily imply that they went to the abode of 
the Most High, as "heaven" is used in a general sense as designating the 
fuT.iament over our heads, which we know is a wide expanse, while "th^ 
heaven of heavens" points to the region inhabited by Deity. If it be asked, 
Wliere are they ? the answer is, No one knows ; because there is no testimony 
on the subject beyond that of Christ's, which proves that they did not go to the 
heaven of which he was speakuig. 

And especially is it true that there is no record in the Scriptures of any dea4 
man ha^TJig gone to heaven. The record is the other way — that the dead are 
in their graves, knowing nothing, feeling nothing, awaiting resurrection. 0= 
David it is specifically declared that he has not attained to the sky translation 
wliich iu funeral sermons is assigned to every righteous soul. And David, 
remember, was "a man after God's own heart," and certain, therefore, of 
admission into heaven at death, if anybody was. Yet Peter says — 

"Men and brethren, let me freely speak unto you of the patriarch David, fhat he is 
both dead and buried, and his seimlchre is with us unto this day . . FOR DAVID IS 
NOT ASCENDED INTO THE HEAVENS."— Acts ii. 29, 34. 

This is emphatic enough. Again, let Paul speak of the "great cloud of 
witnesses," who have passed away — the faithful saints of old times, who are 
supposed to be before the throne of G-od, "inheriting the promises," and he 
tells us — 

" These all died in faith, NOT HAVING RECER'ED THE PE03IISES, but having 
seen them afar off, vere persuaded of them and embraced them, and confessed that 
they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth." — Heb. xi. 13. 

And in the same chapter, verses 39-40, he repeats — 

" These aU having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promises. 
God having provided some better thing for us that they without us SHOULD NOT 
BE MADE PERFECT." 

If we consult those cases recorded in the Scriptures, in which consolation is 
administered in reference to the dead, we shall find a marked absence of those 
doctrines which are enforced with such peculiar urgency by the religious 
teachers of the present day, when they have to discourse of the departed, such 
as in fuiieral sermons, byway of "improvmg the occasion." When Martha 



67 

told Jesus that Lazarus was dead, he did not tell her he was hetter where he 
was. He said (John xi. 23), " Thy hrother shall rise again.''' 

Or, let the case of the Thessalonians be consulted. Deatli had removed some 
of the believers among them ; and the survivors, who had evidently calculated 
upon their living until the coming of the Lord, were filled with sorrow. In 
this condition, Paul wi'ites to comfort them. Suppose a minister of the nine- 
teenth century had had the duty to perform, what would have been his 
language? ''You must rejoice, my friends, for those who are dead, for they are 
gone to glory. They are delivered from the trials and vexations of this life, 
and are promoted to felicity far more perfect and lasting than they ever 
realized in this vale of tears. It is selfish of you to grieve ; you ought rather 
to be glad that they have reached the haven of eternal rest." 

But what says Paul ? Does he tell them their friends are happy in heaven ? 
This was the time to say so if it were true ; but no ; his words are — 

"I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them who are asleep, 
that ye sorrow not even as others who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died 
and rose again, even so them also that sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. (When ?) 
For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain 
unto the coming of the Lord, shall not prevent (or precede) them who are asleep : For 
the Lord himself shall descend from heaven yifiih. Si. shout, with the voice of the arch- 
angel and the trump of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise first ; then we which 
are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet 
the Lord in the air ; and so shall we ever be with the Lord. Wherefore comfort one 
another with these loords.^' — 1 Thess. iv. 13—18. 

The second coming of Christ and the resurrection are the events to whicli 
Paul directs their minds for consolation ; but if it be true that the righteous go 
to their reward immediately after death, undoubtedly, such a reflection 
affording consolation, Paul would have been certain to suggest it in this 
case, instead of referring them to the remote, and (in the orthodox view) 
comparatively unattractive event of the resurrection. The fact that he does 
not do so, is circumstantial proof that it is not true. 

The earth we inhabit is the destined arena for the manifestation of Jehovah's 
great salvation. Here subsequently to the resurrection, will the reward be 
conferred and enjoyed. This is evident from a variety of scripture testimony. 
Solomon leads off by declaring "Behold the righteous shall he recomjpcnsed in 
the earth; (Prov. xi. 31), and the statement is confirmed by the saying of 
Christ. 

"Blessed are the meek; for they shall inherit the earthy — Matt. v. 5. 

And further, in Psalm xxxvii. 9-11, where the Spirit, speaking through 
David, says — 



6S 

"Evil-doers shall be cut off; but tli(;se tJb.it wait upon the Lord, they sJiall inJieHt 
the earth. For yet a little -svhile aud the wicked shaU not be ; yea thou shalt 
diligently consider his place, and it shall ]iot be. But the meek shall inherit the earth, 
and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace." 

Some further con-ohoration is to be draT\Ti from the following promise to 
Christ, of wliich his people are fellow-heirs with him. 

"I will give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of tJie 
earth for thy possession." — Psalm ii. 8. 

Again, in celebrating the approaching possession of this great inheritance, 
the redeemed are represented as singing — 

*' Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood, out of every kindred 
and tongue, and people and language ; and hast made us unto our God kings anv3 
priests, and we shall reign on tele eaeth.'' — Rev. v. 9, 10. 

And the end of the present dispensation is announced in these words : 

" The Kingdoms of this woeld are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his 
Christ, and he shall reign for ever and ever." — Rev. xi. 15. 

Finally, the angel of the Most High God, in announcing to Daniel, the 
prophet, the same consummation of things, says — 

" The kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom undeh the whole 
heaven, shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High, whose kingdom is 
an everlasting kingdom, and all dominions shall serve and obey him." — Dan. vii. 27. 

"Without going into the particular question involved in these passag-es of 
Scripture, it is sufficient to remark that they unmistakably prove that it is on 
the earth that we are to look for the development of that divine programme of 
events, so clearly indicated in the Scriptui-es of truth, which is to result in 
" glory to Grod in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men." 

Destiny of the Wicked. 

The destiny of the wicked next demands a little attention. If we seek for 
information at the religious systems which are popular to-day, we shall be told 
of an unfathomable abyss of fire, filled with malignant spirits in horrid shape, 
in which are reserved the most exquisite torments for those hapless beings who 
are to be consigned to its terrible custody. We shall be shown a lurid picture 
of fire-innicted torture, and shall hear cursed fiends mocking the damned ; men 
and women shrieking in eternal agony ; a revelry of infernal sounds arising 
from a w^eltering ocean of blackness, fire, and horrible confusion ; and we shall 
be told that God in His eternal counsels of wisdom and mercy, has decreed the 
perpetual continuance of this awful triumph of devilry I Do we believe this 



69 

savage doctrine ? Thousands there are who say they do, and many, doubtless, 

believe they do ; but no man of real intelligence and goodness of nature, can 

calmly sit down and think it over, without feeling that it cannot be true. No 

amount of theorizing can persuade him that God is the merciful being of order 

and harmony brought before us in the Bible, if he ^ told, that with all His 

iorekaowledge and omnipotence. He is to permit nine-tenths of the human race 

to be consigned to an .eternal existence of blaspheming torture indescribable. 

Rather than believe it, he will reject the Bible altogether, and even dispense 

with God from his creed, and take refuge in. the calm, if cheerless, doctrines of 

nationalism. This is what many are driven to, in iinfortunate ignorance of the 

fact that the doctrine is a Pagan fiction. But let it be known, for the comfort of 

all who have been perplexed with the awful dogma, and have yet hesitated to 

renounce it, in fear of also casting aside the Word of God, that it is as 

thoroughly unscriptural as it is ferociously inhuman. The whole teaching of 

the Bible in regard to the destiny of the wicked, is summed up in four words, 

from the 37th Psalm, verse 20 : " The wicJied shall peeish." Paul gives the 

explanation in Rom. vi. 23 : " The wages of sin is death." Death, the 

extinction of being, is the natural predetermined issue of a sinful course. "He 

that soweth to the flesh shall of the flesh reap *^ corruption ^ — (Gal. vi. 8.) And 

that this is equivalent to death, is evident from Rom. viii. 13 — ^'Ifye live after 

the fleshy ye shall die." Corruption results in death, so that the one is equal to 

the other. It may be said that as the righteous die a natural death as well as 

the wicked, it must be some other than physical death that is meant in this 

statement. The answer is, that although the reference is not to the death which 

closes a man's mortal career, yet it is to a death which is no less real, and no 

less destructive, viz., to the second death which occurs at the resurrection, and 

which operates to the same result. The unjust are to be resuscitated for 

judicial arraignment, and their sentence is, that after the infliction of such 

punishment as may be merited, they shall, a second time, by violent and divinely 

wielded agency, be destroyed in death. To this Jesus refers when he says "he 

that loseth his life for my sake and the gospel's, the same shall save it ; but he 

that (in the present life) saveth his life, shall (at the resurrection) lose it;" 

(in the second death). All the phraseology of Scripture on this subject, is 

singularly emphatic, uniformly pointing to one end as the final lot of the 

wicked. For instance, we read in Malachi iv. 1 — 

" Behold the day cometh that shall burn as an oven, and all the proud, yea, and all 
that do wickedly shall he stubble ; and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith 
the Lord of Hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch." 

Again, we find Paul saying, in 2 Thess. i. 9, — 

" They shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord 
and the glory of his power." 



70 

Solomon, on the same subject, uses the following language, — 

" As the lohirlwind passeth, so is the wicked no more ; but the rigMeous i3 an 
everlasting foundation." — Prov. x. 25. 

And again, Prov. ii. 22, — 

" The wicked shall he cut off from the earth, and the trangressors shall be rooted out 
of it." 

Zophar gives the following emphatic testimony : — 

" Knowost thou not this of old, — since man was placed upon earth — that the 
triumph of the wicked is short, and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment ? 
Though his excellency mount up to the heavens, and his head reach unto the clouds, 
yet HE SHALL PERISH FOR EVER LIKE HIS OWN DUNG. They that havo seen him 
shall say, Where is he ? He shall fly away as a dream, and shall not be found, yea, he 
shall be chased away as a vision of the night." — Job xx. 4 — 8. 

David employs the following graphic figure, to the same purport : 

" The wicked shall perish. The enemies of the Lord shall be as the fat of lambe. 
They shall consume ; into smoke they shall consume away^ — Psalm xxxvii. 20. 

And we read in Psalm xlix. 6 — 20, — 

" They that trust in their wealth and boast themselves in the multitude of their 
riches, . . , their inward thought is that their houses shall continue for 
ever, and their dwelling j^laces to all generations. They call their land after their 
own names. Nevertheless man, being in honour, abidethnot: he is like the beasts that 
perish. This their way is their folly — ^yet their posterity approve their sayings. Like 
sheep they are laid in the grave; death shall feed on them; and the upright shall 
have dominion over them in the morning . . . He shall go to the generation 
of his fathers, they shall never see light. Man that is in honour, and under- 
standeth not, is like tlie beasts that perish.'^ 

And of their final state we read in Isaiah xxvi. 14, — 

" They are dead, they shall not live : they are deceased, they shall not rise ; therefore 
hast Thou visited and destroyed them, and made all their memory to perish." 

The teaching of these testimonies requires no elucidation ; it is enunciated 
with an emphasis of language that leaves no room for comment. It is that 
*' the righteous shall be had in everlasting remembrance ; but the name of the 
Tricked shall rot.'' It is that the wicked who are an offence to God, and an 
affliction to themselves, and of no use to anybody, shall be put aside, and 
consigned to a painless oblivion, in which their very name will be forgotten. 
Yet the wicked do not escape j)unishment ; but of this, and of these passages 
which seem to favour the popular doctrine, we shall be compelled for want of 
present space, to treat in the next lecture. 

It may seem to the reader that the word "hell," as employed in the Bible, 
presents an obstacle to the \dews advanced in this lecture. If the original word 
carried with it the idea represented to the popular mind by its short, pithy, 
Saxon equivalent, the views of orthodoxy would be capable of unanswerable 
dc^monstrfltion, for the word is frequent enough, and is used in connection with 



71 

the destiny of the wicked. But the case stands otherwise. The original word 
has no affinity with its modern use. One does not require to be a scholar to see 
this. A due familiarity with the English Bible will carry conviction on the 
point, though conviction is undoubtedly strengthened by a knowledge of the 
original. What, for instance, has the orthodox believer to say to the 
following ? — 

"And they (Meshec, Tubal, and all her multitude,) shall not lie with the mighty that 
are fallen of the uncircumcised, which are gone down to hell with their weapons 
OP WAR; and they have laid their swords under their head.^' — Ezek. xxxii. 27. 

Do men's immortal souls take swords and guns with them when they " go to 
hell ? " The hell of the Bible is a place to which military accoutrements may 
accompany the wearer. The nature and locality of this hell may be gathered 
from a statement only four verses before the passage above quoted. "Asshur is 
there and all her company, his graves are about him, all of them slain, fallen by 
the sword, whose graves are set in the sides of the pit, and her company is round 
ahout HER GRAVE." The reference is to the Eastern mode of sepulture, in 
which a pit or cave was used for burial — the bodies of the dead being deposited 
in niches cut in the wall. As a mark of military honour, soldiers were buried 
with their weapons, the sword being laid under their head. They ^' went down 
to hell with their weapons of war ^ It vdll be perceived that hell is synonymous 
with grave. This is proved, so far at least as the Old Testament is concerned. 
The original word is sheol, which means nothing more than a concealed or 
covered place, and therefore an appropriate designation for the grave, in which 
a man is for ever concealed from view. It will be found that every use of the 
word "hell" in the Old Testament, wiU fall under this general explanation. 
As regards the New Testament, there is the same simplicity and absence of 
difficulty in the use of the word "hell." The original word is, of course, different, 
being Greek instead of Hebrew ; it is in nearly all cases hades. That this is 
equal to the Hebrew word sheol, is evident from its use as an equivalent for it in 
the Septuagint (Greek) translation of the Hebrew Scriptures ; and also in its 
use by the writers of the New Testament, where sheol occurs in the Hebrew. 
For instance, in David's prophecy of the resurrection of Christ, cited by Peter 
on the day of Pentecost ("thou wilt not leave my soul in hell," c.v.), the word 
in Hebrew is sheol^ and in Greek hades. In this instance, hell simply and HteraUy 
means the grave, in view of which we see the point of the prediction brought 
to bear by Petei: Understood as the orthodox hell, there is no point in it at 
all ; for resurrection of the body has no point of connection with the escape of 
a so-called immortal soul from the abyss of popular superstition. A similar 
consideration arises upon 1 Cor. xv. 55 : "0 grave (hades), where is thy 
victory ? " This is the exclamation of the righteous in reference to resurrec- 



72 

tion, as anyone ma}^ see on consulting the context. Our translators, perceh^ng 
tliis, instead of rendering hades by "hell/' have given us the more suitable 
v/ord "grave ; " but if hades may be translated grave here, why not everywhere 
else ? 

There is another word translated hell, which does not mean the grave, but 
which at the same time affords as little countenance to orthodox belief as hades. 
That is, gehenna. It occurs in the following passages : Matt. v. 22, 29, 30 ; x, 
28 ; xviii. 9 ; xxiii. 15, 33 ; Mark ix. 43, 45, 47 ; Luke xii. 5 ; Jas. iii. 6. The 
word ought not to be translated at all. It is a proper name, and like all other proper 
names, should have been transferred to the English version without alteration 
beyond the process Imown as "Anglicization." It is a Greek compound sig- 
nifying the vaUey of the Son of Hinnom. Calmet in his Bible Dictionary, defining 
it, has the following : " Gehenna or Gehennom, or Valley of Hennom, or 
VaUey of the Son of Hennom (see Josh, xv, 8 ; 2 Kings xxiii. 10), a valley 
adjacent to Jerusalem, through which the southern limits of the tribe of 
Benjamin passed." He states that it was used in ancient times by the idola- 
trous Jews, to conduct the worship of Moloch, and offer their children to the 
heathen gods. Josiah, in his zeal for the abolition of idolatry, resolved to give 
the valley over to pollution, and commanded the deposit of the filth of the city 
in it. It became the receptacle of much poDution. Carcases of men and beasts 
were thrown into it, and fires were kept perpetually burning, to consume the 
rubbish and prevent pestilence. In the days of Jesus, it was the highest mark 
of social ignominy that the council of the Jews could inflict, to order a man to 
be buried in Gehenna. In one of Jeremiah's prophecies of Jewish restoration, 
the obliteration of this vaUey of dishonour is predicted in the following words: 
*'^And the whole valley of the dead bodies and of the ashes, and aU the fields unto 
the brook of Kedron, unto the comer of the horse gate, toward the east, shall be 
holy\nnto the Lord.'' — (Jer. xxxi. 40.) On what pretence is Gehenna translated 
"heU," and thus made to favour popular delusions? Simply because our 
translators thinh that ancient Gehenna was a type of the heU of their creed. 
This is altogether an assumption. It is the assumption upon which Calmet' s 
remarks are based, notwithstanding his knowledge of the subject. He was of 
the orthodox school, and makes the common orthodox mistake of begging the 
question to begin with. Let orthodox heU be proved first before Gehenna, is 
used in the argument. If it is a type of anything, is it not rather a type of the 
judgment revealed, and not of one imagined ? Orthodox hell is a mere imagi- 
nation, based upon Pagan speculations on futurity. The judgment revealed is 
one related to the same locality, and one that will take the same form as regards 
circumstance and result. " They (who come to worship at Jerusalem in the 
future age, verses 20—23) shall go forth and look upon the carcases of the men 



73 

that Jiave transgressed against me : for their worm shall not die, neither shall 
their fire be quenched ; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh." — (Isa, 
Ixvi. 24.) The reader will observe a similarity between these words and the 
words of Christ in Mark ix. 44 — 48 ; " Where the worm dieth not and the fire 
is not quenched." These words are frequently quoted in support of the 
orthodox theory of eternal torments, but they really bear in the contrary 
direction. 

In the first place, the undying worm and the unquenchable fire must be 
admitted to be s^nmbolical expressions. The worm is an agent of corruption, 
ending in death or annihilation. Pire is a means to the same end, but by a 
more summary process. When, therefore, they are said to be unarrestable in 
their action, it must be taken to indicate that destruction will be accomplished 
without remedy. The expression cannot mean inmiortal worms, and absolutely 
inextinguishable fire. A limited sense to an apparently absolute expression is 
frequently exemplified throughout the Scriptures. In Jer. vii. 20, Jehovah says, 
" His anger should be poured out upon Jerusalem, and ' should hum and should 
not be quenched.'' " He says also in Jer. xvii. 27, "I will kindle a fire in the gates 
of Jerusalem, and it shall bum the palaces thereof, and it shall not be q\Lenched'' 
This did not mean that the fixe with reference to itself should never go put, but 
that in relation to the object of its operation, it should not be quenched till the 
operation was accomplished. A fire was kindled in Jerusalem, and only went 
out when Jerusalem was burnt to the ground. So also God's anger burned 
against Israel, until it burnt them out of the land, driving them out of His 
sight; but Isaiah speaks of a time when G-od's anger will cease in the destruc- 
tion of the enemy (chap. x. 25). The same principle is illustrated in the 21st 
chapter of Ezekiel, verses 3, 4, 5, where Jehovah states that His sword will go 
forth out of its sheath against all flesh, and shall no more retiirn again. It is 
not necessary to say that in the consummation of God's purpose. His loving- 
Idndness will triumph over all exhibitions of anger which have for their object 
the extirpation of evil. In the absolute sense, therefore, His sword of vengeance 
will return to its sheath, but not in the sense of failing to accomplish its 
purpose. So the worm that preys upon the wicked wiU disappear from the 
face of the earth, when the last enemy, deaiii, is destroyed, and the fire that 
consumes their corrupt remains will die with the fuel it feeds on; but in 
relation to the wicked themselves, the v/orm dieth not, and the fire is not 
quenched. The expressions were borrowed from Gehenna, where the flame 
was fed, and the worm sustained continually by the putrid accumulations of 
the valley. 

The statement in Matt. xxv. 46, is equally unavailing for the popular 
doctrine. " These shall go away into everlasting jjxmislxment^ and the right- 



74 

eons into life eternal." Even taken, as it stands, in the English version, this 
does not define the nature of the punishment which is to fall on the wicked, 
but only affirms its perpetuity. The nature of it is elsewhere described as 
death and destruction. But viewing the word aioman (translated " everlast- 
ing"), as expressing the idea of belonging to the age, the statement only proves 
that at the resurrection, the wicked will be punished with the punishment 
charncterisflcalhj pertaining to the age of Christ's advent, which Paul declares 
to be " EVERLASTING DESTRUCTION from the presence of the Lord, and from the 
glory of His power," (2 Thess. i. 9,) and that the righteous will receive the 
life related to the same dispensation, which Paul declares to be immortality 
(1 Cor. XV. 53). It is usual to quote a statement from the Apocalypse (Pev. 
xiv. 11 ; XX. 10), in evident indifference to the fact that as part of a symbolical 
vision, it is not to be received in the literal sense, but to be construed mystically 
in harmony with the principle of interpretation supplied in the vision. If 
Apocalyptic torment "for ever and ever" is literal, then the beast, the woman 
with the golden cup, the lamb v/ith seven horns and seven eyes, are literal also. 
Is the orthodox believer prepared for this ? Surely Christ is not in the shape of 
a seven-horned lamb ; surely the false Church is not a literal prostitute, or the 
Church's persecutor a literal wild boar of the woods. If these are symbolical, 
the things affirmed of them are symbolical also, and torment (or judicial 
infliction, for this is the idea of casanizo, the Greek word) " for ever and ever" 
is the symbol of the complete, and resistless, and final triumph of God's 
destroying judgment over the things represented. 

Failing Scriptural evidence; the orthodox believer takes refuge among " the 
ancient Egyptians, the Persians, PhcenicianSj Scythians, Druids, Assyiians, 
Romans, Greeks, &c.," and among "the wisest and most celebrated ;^hilosophers 
on record." All these people, shouts the benighted patron of ancient times, 
the superstitious and dark-minded heathen of every land, the founders of the 
wisdom of this world, wliich is foolishness with God, all believed in the immor- 
tality of the soul, and this is undeniable proof that the immortality of the 
soul is true! What logic extraordinary! One would think the fact that 
ignorant and superstitious ancestors believed in the immortality of the soul is 
"an undeniable proof" that the immortality of the soul is not true. What 
says Paul? Speaking of the period prior to the preaching of the gospel (and 
referring to Gentile nations), he calls it "the times of ignorance." — (Acts xvii. 
30); and of the wisdom which men had educed for themselves, through the 
reasonings of "the wisest and most celebrated philosophers," he says, "Hath 
not Ood made foolish the wisdom of this world?" "The wisdom of this 
worid is FOOLISHNESS with God." — (1 Cor. i. 20; iii. 19.) A wise man prefers 
being on Paul's side; and in taking this side, he must of course place himself 



75 

against the orthodox believer, for the orthodox believer glories in the wisdom 
of ancient philosophy and paganism, which Paul pronounces foolishness. 
Besides, let the orthodox believer say whether he does not believe the statement 
of Paul that immortality was brought to light by Christ in the gospel? — (2 
Tim., i. 10). If so, how can he pretend to believe in the version of it put 
forward by the ''wisest and most celebrated philosophers" who lived centuries 
before Christ appeared, and whose wisdom Paul, speaking by the Spirit, 
pronounces "foolishness?" The orthodox believer is condemned on his own 
premisses. Either Christ brought the truth of the matter to light, or he did 
not. If he did, the doctrines before his time were darkness; if the doctrines 
before his time (rejoiced in by the orthodox believer) were not darkness, but 
light, then Christ did not bring the truth to Kght in the gospel, for in that 
case it was brought to light before the gospel was preached. 

But many who were once orthodox are losing their orthodoxy, and are 
begimiing to see that the teaching of the Bible is one thing and popular religion 
another. The following extract from a work just published in America, (the 
Theology of the Bible, by Judge Halsted) wiU illustrate this. " The Rev. 
Dr. Theodore Clapp, in his autobiography, says he had preached at New 
Orleans, a zealous sermon for endless punishment; that after the sermon, 
Judge W., who, says he, was an eminent scholar, and had studied for the 
ministry, but relinquished his purpose, because he could not find the doctrine 
of endless punishment and kindred dogmas, asked him to make out a list , of 
texts in the Hebrew or G-reek on which he relied for the doctrine. The doctor 
then gives a detailed account of his studies in search of texts to give to the 
judge : that he began with the Old Testament in the Hebrew ; and prosecuted 
his study during that and the succeeding year ; and yet he was unable to find 
therein so much as an allusion to any suffering after death ; that in the diction- 
ary of the Hebrew language he could not discern a word signifying hell, or a 
place of punishment in a future state ; that he could not find a single text, 
in any form of phraseology, which holds out threats of retribution beyond 
the grave ; that to his utter astonishment it turned out that orthodox critics 
of the greatest celebrity were perfectly familiar with these facts ; that he was 
compelled to confess to the judge that he could not produce any Hebrew text ; 
but that still he was sanguine that the New Testament would furnish what ho 
had sought for without success in Moses and the prophets ; that he prosecuted 
his study of the Greek of the New Testament eight years ; that the result was 
that he could not name a portion of it, from the first verse in Matthew to the 
last of Revelations, which, fairly interpreted, affirms that a part of mankind 
will be eternally miserable. The doctor concludes by saying it is an important, 
most instructive fact, that he was broug:ht into his present state of mind (the 



76 

repudiation of the dogma) by the Bible only — a state of mind running counter 
to all the prejudices of his early life, of parental precept, of school, theological 
seminary, and professional caste." 

Here then is a view, which, divesting the future of that lurid and horrible 
aspect in which it is presented in orthodox doctrines, reveals it in a calm, 
peaceful, harmonious, and benignant aspect, pointing to a G-od whose wisdom 
and benevolence conjoin in the elaboration of a scheme which shall be produc- 
tive of the gTcatest amount of happiness to man and glory to Himself. It 
aboliehes the great scarecrow of creation, and takes out of the hand of the 
Infidel the most potent weapon which he wields against that holy book, which 
is the hope of mankind. In fact, it substitutes wisdom for foolishness, peace 
for disquietude, harmony for discord, order for confusion, and removes from 
religion the one great element whir-h has conduced to render it a moping and 
cheerless thing, only adapted to morbid and unsociable minds. 



LECTURE IV. 



niMORTALITY A COXBITIOXAL GIFT TO BE BESTOWED AT 
TKE EESVERECTION. 

The design of the present lectui-e is to supply the lack created by the two 
previous ones. Having shown human nature to be essentially mortal in its 
constitution, and death in relation to it, to be the destruction of its existence, 
and the consequent obliteration of all its manifested powers, it is incumbent 
to anticipate enquiry by saying something as to the true relation of a future 
life to our perishing race. Many rashly jump to the conclusion that the 
position taken in the two previous lectures involves a denial of future retri- 
bution altogether, and even the rejection of the existence of God. It certainly 
leads to a modification of popular views on these subjects, but is by no means 
so destructive in its results as represented. In any case these results are borne 
out by the testimony of the Bible ; so that no devout mind need be troubled at 
ha\'ing to commit himself to them. 

It is proposed, in the present lecture, to consider the true doctrine of 
immortality, as brought before us in the word of God. Is such a God-like 
inheritance attainable by mortal man r If so, how ? Is the whole race 
destined to possess it, or only a selected class ? If a selected class only, on 



77 

what principle are they developed or chosen ? These are the questions that 
demand our consideration. Let us note, to begin with, that there is a natural 
aspiration in the human breast for immortality. The lowest forms of human 
nature, such as idiots and the lower types of human life, may be destitute of 
it, but where human nature has developed to anything like its natural standard, 
there is this craving after the perfect and the unending. We seem mentally 
constituted for them. Death comes as an unnatural event in our experience. 
We dislike it ; we dread it ; we would fly far from it if we could ; Vv^e long for 
immortahty ; we desire to be beyond the reach of the great enemy ; we 
aspire to live for ever. It is customary to reason upon this fact as a proof 
that we actually possess the immortal in our nature. This is the principal 
argument used by Plato, who may be said to be the father of the doctrine of 
the immortality of the soul. The argument is gladly re-echoed by his 
disciples in the present day. It is astonishing that its logic should have 
passed unquestioned so long. Such a style of reasoning adoj^ted in the case 
of any other instinct or desire would be justly scouted. Fancy a hungry man 
being told that his cravings were proof of repletion ! The reasoning turns 
just the other way. If we desire a thing, our desire is evidence that we are 
yet without the object of desire ; for, as Paul says, " T\Tiat a man seeth, why 
doth he yet hope for ? " If we experience a longing- for inmiortality, far 
from such a feeling proving to us that immortality is our peculiar gift, it 
testifies that we are destitute of it, and destroys the doctrine of the im- 
mortahty of the soul. Yet the existence of such a desire proves a great deal 
in its own place. ISTo instinct or desire exists in nature without an object on 
which it acts. Are we hungry ? There is food to be eaten. Are we curious? 
There are things to be seen and known. Have we benevolence ? There is 
benefit to be conferred, need to be supplied, and suffering to be alleviated. 
Have we conscience ? There is right and wrong. Have we marvellousness ? 
There is incomprehensibility in heaven above and earth beneg^th. Have we 
veneration ? There is God to adore. And so on, with every feeling through- 
out sentient nature. Now, on this irrefragable principle, the spontaneous and 
universal craving in the human breast for immortality and perfection proves 
the existence of the conditions required, and the possibility of their attain- 
ment; and though we may be ignorant as Hottentots of the "where," 
"when," "how," &c., relating t© it, the general proof remains irrefutable. 
Still we must use proper discrimination as to its logical extent. It does not 
prove the necessary and inevitable attainment of immortahty by any ; for tlie 
existence of a desire is no guarantee of its gratification. A man of great 
alimentive capacity may be in circumstances where food cannot bo obtained. 
He may be shut up ia a Hartley coHiery, and death is the consequence. His 



78 

alimentiveness points to food as its proper object, but does not insure 
possession of it; that is a question of proper circumstance. The logical 
deduction from this longing for immortahty is, that as God would never 
have implanted in man an instinct which it was impossible to gratify, 
immortahty and perfection are attainable conditions ; but that the gratification 
of a desire being dependent upon proper relative circumstances, these 
conditions are not the necessary and inevitable attainment of any. This cuts 
between the orthodox believer and infidel, refuting the immortal soulism of 
the one, and demoHshing the heartless assumption of the other. 

What is immortahty ? "We can best comprehend a thing by contrast. On 
this principle, let us consider mortahty for a moment, from which the idea of 
'?;?^(not)mortaHty is found. The word comes from the Latin root " mors^'' 
death, and signifies deathfulness. To say of anything that it is mortal, is to 
alfirm that it is limited in its power of duration, owing to inherent tendency to 
dissolution. We say of man that he is mortal ; and so he is. We behold him 
daily perishing. He comes into existence as an organised being, inheriting 
aU the quahties of the organizations from which his nature is derived ; but 
however noble those quahties may be, however lofty the genius, however far- 
seeing the intellect, however genial the friendship, however lovely the general 
character, the hand of death stays not; the law of sin working in his members, 
operates to a predetermined conclusion. Life is withdrawn ; and he sinks to 
the obhvion from which he emerged. This is the mortahty of human 
experience — the destruction of the noblest being that moves in sublunary 
creation. 

Popular theory urges another view. It says that the mortahty of common 
experience is related to co7iditio7i, not to beinrj : that it changes a man's place 
of existence, but does not destroy himseK. This idea arises from an error of a 
subtle nature — an error concerning hfe. It is not an error to affirm the 
indestructibihty of life in the abstract, because as an element of "nature," it is 
an imperishable thing, constantly irradiating from the Source of all life and 
power. The same thing is also true of matter in any form ; it is indestructible 
in its essential elements. The error consists in regarding life as a thinking 
individual power in its abstract condition. So far as we can comprehend it in 
relation to man, the very opposite of this is true ; it (spirit, or abstract life) 
presents itself as the MmyeTsal j^abulum of conscious existence — the basis from 
which individual thinking phenomena are evolved by organization. Unorganized, 
it does not present any evidence of conscious faculty. That power, so to speak, 
is latent in the vast ocean of hfe-power, that springs from the Great Eternal 
Fountain, and can only be developed by what men have been pleased to call 
*' organization." The thing may seem a mystery ; but certainly not more so 



79 

than the metaphysical view which attempts to ex]3laiii a mystery by a greater 
mystery still. Mystery or no mystery, it is the teaching of experience and the 
declaration of the word of God. "They all have one breath^'' (or spirit — 
the same word) is Solomon's statement concerning- men and animals 
(Ecclesiastes iii. 19). Moses is equally decisive in his testimony. Spealdng of 
the flood, he says (Gen. vii. 23) "And eve7'y living sudstaoice ws^s destrojed 
which was upon the face of the ground, both man, and cattle, and creeping 
things." Again, (Gen. vii. 21, 22) " And all flesh died that moved upon the 
earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing, 
and every ma7i ; ALL in whose nostrils was the breath oflife^ died." Here 
man is categorised with animals, as belonging to the same class of existence — 
being a creature of " living substance" inhaling the universal " breath of life" 
shared by all. " The Sjnrit of God is in my nostrils," says Job (chap, xxvii. 
3). "Cease ye from man whose breath is in his nostrils^'^ is the command of 
inspiration in Isaiah ii. 22. God " gathering unto Himself His spirit and His 
breath," is Zophar's description of death in Job xxxiv. 14. Mark, the " spirit " 
is spoken of as the Almighty's; and man — the substance-creature — as the 
possessor of spirit ; but philosophy has inverted this order of ideas. It has 
made the spirit into the possessor, and the body as the thing possessed ; and 
here has originated thfe immortal-soul theory with all its concomitant doctrines 
of disembodied sky-kingdom rewards, hell punishments, &c., &c. That theory 
is a delusion which blinds the understanding of all who labour under it, giving 
rise to many gratuitous difficulties as to God's moral government of the world, 
and preventing a proper apprehension of the doctrines of Christianity, which 
have for their very foundation the truth that man is an evanescent form of 
conscious life, to whom the day of death is appointed. 

That man having strong instinctive desires for immortality and perfection, 
should yet be subject to sin and death, and surrounded with imperfection, dis- 
order, and misery, requires explanation. This explanation, "nature" refuses 
to furnish. If we look upon the condition of man as a natural accident, we 
have an impenetrable mystery to deal with. We have to account on natural 
principles for the fact, that while nature establishes the strictest correspondence 
between instinct and condition in the case of every other species throughout 
her wide domain, she refuses this happiness-producing adaptation in the case 
of her noblest production — man, leaving him to the wretchedness of disappointed 
noble aspiration. This it is simply impossible to do. Unaided by Revelation, 
human condition and destiny must for ever remain an insoluble enigma. 
Turning to the Bible, however, we have a rational account of the whole matter. 
"We are taken away back to the origin of our species. "VYe are she^vn Adam 
and Eve, our first parents, in primeval innocence, the happy occupants of a 



80 

paradise of heavenly planting. We behold them pursuing the pleasant occupa- 
tion of dressers of that magnificent garden of a thousand hues, spreading itself 
below the warming rays of an Asiatic sun. We contemplate them spending 
their days in the sweetness of innocence, and drinking in the pure delights of 
nature at the hands of young and vigorous creation ; and when we think of 
v.'hat follows, we are taught the lesson that mere sensuous enjoyment is not 
the supreme object of existence — that there are higher actions of the mind, 
more serious responsibilities, more exalted obligations, which exercise alone 
can wake us up to — that God is the highest, and demands the absolutt 
submission of our tntlUs and affections to Him as the essential condition of our 
own happiness and His pleasure. Adam is prohibited from touching a certain 
tree in the midst of the garden, not because the tree was intrinsically baxi, 
or that there was any sin in the act itself, but because such a prohibition was, 
in the circumstances, the simplest and most convenient mode of testing his 
obedience, and thereby educating him in regard to his relations to the Almighty. 
'* Where there is no law, there is no transgTession," says Paul. So long as 
the tree was free from prohibition, Adam was at liberty to use it as freely as 
the others; but the prohibition having been enjoined, it became unlawful for 
him to touch it. How long Adam continued to obey, we are not informed ; 
but we know that in course of time, he was induced to infringe the Divine 
enactment. 

" TMien the \rcman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to 
the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise, she tock of the fruit thereof, and 
did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her, and he did eat." — Gen. iii. 6. 

The consequence of this act was most calamitous to the Elohim -imaged man. 

" Beccinse thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the 
tree wiiich I commanded thee, saying. Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground 
for thy sake ; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy hfe; thorns also and 
thistles shall it bring forth to thee, and thou shalt eat the herb of the field— in the 
sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return unto the ground^ for out of it 
wast thou taken, for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.''^ — 17-19. 

Here is an explanation of the present exceptional condition of the human 
race. Adam, originally created with a view to possible immortality, was 
doomed to return to his original nothingness, and doubtless there then 
commenced in him that process of physical decay which terminates aU in death, 
or, more probably still, the constitutional tendency of his nature was allowed 
to go forward unarrested. Having all sprung from Adam, we have, of course, 
inherited the death-tending qualities of his nature, because " the clean cannot 
come out of the unclean." Lions don't produce sheep. And, oa this principle, 
death hath passed upon aU men through Adam; and so we find ourselves 



81 

mortal. It is no uncommon tiling now-a-days to jest upon tMs subject, and 
tp mockingly enquire whyOod did not prevent this result. It is useless to 
attempt an answer to those who are guilty of this folly, because they are not 
in a frame of mind to appreciate it. The very question evinces a shallowness 
of thought and, in most cases, a flippancy of moral nature which it is a mis- 
fortune to possess. To answer is like tliroT^ong pearls before swine ; they are 
certain to " turn again and rend." The deep thinking and the devout will have 
no difficulty in perceiving that the occurrence of such a bitter chapter in 
human history was incidental to the investiture of man with the God-like 
prerogative of free agency; and, further, that its occurrence was foreseen by 
the Almighty, and intended by Him to be the basis on which He should estab- 
lish the triumph of eternal benevolence and eternal wisdom. A mind of the 
cast alluded to will regard it as destined subordinately to lead to ultimate 
results, so perfectly glorious as to show the infinite wisdom and mercy of God 
in permitting it. That man should be mortal in the present state, seems to 
have been part of the divine plan ; for even after the transgression, and the 
passing of the sentence consequent upon it, a precaution was taken for the 
purpose expressed in these words, taken from the 3rd chap, of Genesis (verses 
22 and 23)— 

"And now lest he (Adam) put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and 
eat and live for ever-, therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the Garden of Eden 
to till the ground from whence he was taken." 

Let those who believe in the natural immortality of man, ponder the import 
of these words. What necessity would there have been for preventing Ad^ m 
from eating of the tree of life "lest he should Hve for ever," if he were already 
and essentially immortal? Adam being mortal, however, the precaution was a 
very merciful one ; for, had Adam, in his fallen and unhappy state, become 
invested with immortality, the earth would have become peopled with undying 
sinful men, who in the course of ages would have multiplied and overcrowded 
the globe, which would have been a scene of indescribable vdckedness, 
confusion and misery. Eut this terrible calamity was averted. Adam was 
excluded from access to the other tree, which under a provisional arrangement, 
had been endowed with Life-giving virtue, and so continued mortal: and his 
descendants, though innumerable, sin- stricken, and wretched, are mercifully 
swept away, generation after generation, Hke grass before the mower. 

As the Scriptures are the only source whence we derive any rational account 
of the present mortal and afflicted condition of manldnd, so do they constitute 
the only revelation of his future destiny. Job asks, " If a man die, shall he 
live again?" This is the question which it is the special function of the 
Bible to answer. From no other source can we procure an answer. If we 



82 

speculate upon it as a philosophical problem, we land in the dark. There is 
no process in nature from which we can reason on the subject. There is no 
real parallel to resurrection. A seed deposited in the ground, springs again, 
and renews its existence ; but this is the law of its nature. The power to spring 
again is part of itself. Not so with man. To use the words of Job .(chap, 
xiv. 7-10)— 

" There is hope of a tree if it be cut down that it will sprout again, and that the 
tender branch thereof will not cease. Though the root thereof wax old in the earth, 
and the stock thereof die in the ground, yet through the scent of water, it will bud 
and bring forth boughs like a plant. But man dieth and wasteth away, yea,man giveth 
up the ghost, and where is he ? " 

Where is he ? The answer is a simple one ; he is nowhere. The dust has 
returned to the earth as it was, and his life-spirit has returned to God who 
gave it ; and though both dust and life continue to exist as separate elements, 
the 7?ian who resulted from their organic combination, has ceased to be ; and 
if he ever live again, it will be the result of a fresh creative effort on the part 
of the Almighty. 

That he will live again, is one of the blessed teachings of the Word of God. 
" Since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead." — 
(1 Cor. XV. 21.) It was the peculiar mission of Christ to bring this truth to light. 
He proclaimed himself the " Resurrection and the Life " (John xi. 25), adding, 
" He that believeth on me, thotigh he were dead, yet shall he live." He came, 
not simply to re-iufuse spiritual vigour unto the deadened moral natures of 
men, but to open a way of deliverance from the physical law of death which is 
sweeping them into the grave, and keeping them there. He came, in fact, to 
raise the bodies of men — which are the men themselves — from the pit of 
corruption, and to endow them, if accepted, with incorruptibility and 
immortality. Paul says — ^^ He will change our vile bodies, and fashion them 
like unto his own glorious body." — (Philip, iii. 21.) This is connected with the 
resurrection : for Jesus himseK says, " This is the Father's vdll who hath 
tient me, that of all which he hath given me I should lose nothing, htit should 
raise it vj) again at the last day."" — (John vi. 39.) Thus life and immortality 
are said to have been "brought to light by Jesus Chiist through the gospel." 
— (2 Tim. i. 10.) In fact, without ignoring the sacrificial aspect of Christ's 
character as the Saviour of the world from sin, and as the reconciler of the 
world to God, from whom aU men have gone astray, it may safely be said that 
the principal and ultimate object of his mission was to offer men everlasting life. 
This will appear from the following citations from the New Testament : 

I am come that they might have life— that they might have it more abundantly. ^' — 
John X. 10. 



83 

" God sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through fiim." — 
1 John iv. 9. 

" Ye will not come to me that ye might have life." — John v. 40. 
'* I am the resurrection and the life." — John xi. 25. 

"God so loved the world that he gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever 
believeth in him should not perish, hut have everlasting life." — John iii. 16. 

" Thou, (the Father,) hast given him (the Son) power over all flesh, that he should give 
eternal life to as many as Thou hast given him." — John xvii. 2. 

" My sheep hear my voice . . . I give unto them eternal life ; and they shall 
never perish ; neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand." — John x. 28. 

" This is the record, that God hath given unto us eternal life, and this life is in his 
jSon.''— 1 John v. 11. 

" This is the promise that He hath promised us, even eternal life." — 1 John ii. 25. 

" The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ 
our Lord," — Romans vi. 23. 

" That being justified by his grace, we should be madeheiTS according to the hope of 
eternal life."— Titus iii. 7. 

" Keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus 
Christ unto eternal life." — Jude 21. 

Now, if immortality be the natural attribute of every son of Adam trom the 
very moment he breathes, what can be the meaning of testimonies like these 
which, one and all, speak of immortality as a future contingency, a thing to 
be sought for, a reward, a thing to be given, a thing brought to light through 
the gospel, &c.? There is an utter incongruity in such language if immortality 
be a natural and present possession. How can you promise a man that which 
is already his own ? Would it not be trifling with him to attempt to move him 
by th^ sort of incitement ? The divine promise is that God will award eternal 
life to those who seek for glory, honour, and immortality'; and this is the 
strongest proof that human nature is utterly destitute of it at present. 

What is this immortality ? Modern talk on the subject would lead one to 
suppose it was a mental quality, like conscience or benevolence — a thing of 
spiritual condition — an essence which is itself without reference to time or 
space. As death has come to have an artificial theological significance, so in 
these days of religious perversity, immortality itself, the blessed promised gift 
of God through Jesus Christ, has been frittered away into a metaphysical 
subtlety — a scholastic theorem — beyond the comprehension, as it has been placed 
beyond the practical interest of mankind. Bringing common-sense and Scripture 
teaching to bear on this point, we find that immortality is tlie opposite of 
wo?'tality. The one bemg deathfulness in relation to being, as such, the other 
is deathlessncss in the same relation. Both are terms defimte of duration rather 
than oi quality, of life, although quality is implied in both cases. A mortal is a 



84 

creattire of terminable existence, — an immortal, one so constitnted that his lifo 
is endless. Yet the termin ability of the one, and the perpetuity of the other, 
are the result of the established conditions of their natures respectively. Man 
is mortal, because his organism tends to decay. If that organism would go on 
working from year to year, without deterioration, or liability to disorder, he 
would be immortal, because life would be constantly sustained and manifested ; 
but this is impossible. His nature contains within it the seeds of corruption, 
and runs down with unavertable fatality. The finest constitution will succumb 
at last from the sheer exhaustion of its forces. To be immortal, we require to 
be incorruptible in substance; because that which is incorruptible cannot 
decay ; and an incorruptible living organism will live for ever. Hence the 
immortality of the New Testament is a promise of resurrection to incorruptible 
bodily existence. 

" It is sown in cormption, it is raised in incorruption ; it is sown in dishonour, it is 
raised in glory ; it is sown in weakness, it is raised in power; it is sown a natural 
body, it is raised a spiritual body." — 1 Cor. xv. 42 — 44. 

Again (Philippians iii. 21, 22), 

"Jesus Christ shall change our vile bodies, and fashion them like unto his oxen glorious 
lady." 

To obtain immortality, is to be transformed from our present weak, frail, 
corruptible condition of body, into a perfect, incorruptible, powerful condition, 
in which we shall no more be the subjects of weakness, pain, sorrow, and death, 
but shall be like the I>ord Jesus Christ in his present exalted state of existence. 

The time of this transformation has already been hinted at. It occurs at 
the return of Jesus Christ from heaven, as is evident from the following 
testimonies : 

"Jesus Chri^ shall judge the quick and the dead at his appeaeing axd his 
EDsGDOii." — 2 Tim. iv. 1. 

" But every man in his own order (of resurrection) : Chris+ the firstfruits ; afterwards 
they that are Christ's, at his coiiiNG."— 1 Cor. xv.23. 

"Your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life, shall appear , 
THEN shall ye also appear with him in glory " — Col. iii. 4. 

"Behold, I show you a mystery : We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed ; 
in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump; for the trumpet 
Fhall sound, and t)ie dead shall be raised incorruptible ; and we shall be chan.-ed: 
for this corruptible must put on incorruption, und this mortal must put on immortality. 
So WHEN this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have 
put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saytn-g that is written, 
Death is swallowed up in victory."—! Cor. xv. 51—54. 

From the last testimony, taken along with one from the 4th chapter of 
2 Thess., previously quoted, we learn that the faithful in Chiist Jesus who 
are in the land of the living at the second advent of their Lord and Saviour, 



85 

■^i^ — (^of conrse, after they have been judged) — ^undergo an immediate trans- 
formation into the incorruptible nature of the spiritual body, without going 
through the process of death. Hence the statement " we shall not all sleep." 
So that some perhaps now living, like Enoch and Elijah, will be exceptions to 
the general rule of mortality, and " shaU not taste of death." 

As to the nature of the resurrected body, we find in one of the passages 
quoted from Paul's epistles, the words " it is raised a s^piritual tody J' This is 
taken to sanction the idea that it is of impalpable substance — a sort of gaseous, 
shadowy, spectral thing, that a man could drive his hand through — like 
Pepper's ghost. We shaU find that this is a mistaken notion, and that on the 
contrary, the righteous in the perfected state will be as real and corporeal as 
mortal men in the present life. We direct attention to the following statements, 
as evidence on the point : — "He shall change our vile bodies, and fashion them 
LIKE UNTO HIS OWN GLOEious BODY." — (Phil. iii. 21). "We know that when 
Christ shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is." — 
(1 John iii. 2.) Here is a starting point : Christ is the pattern after which his 
people are to be fashioned. If, therefore, we would learn knowledge in regard 
to the nature of the righteous in the future state, we must contemplate the 
nature of Christ subsequent to his resurrection. We are enabled to do this, 
because Christ appeared to his disciples after his resurrection, and had several 
interviews with them. We find him labouring to give evidence to his disciples 
of his reality, when they were terrified by his sudden appearance, and thought 
he was an illusory image before their eyes. 

He said — 

" Why are ye troubled, and "vrliy do thonghts arise in your hearts ? Behold my 
hands and my feet, that it is I myself ; handle me and see ; for a spirit (Greek word in 
many manuscripts, phantasma, phantasm) hath not flesh and bo7ies, as ye see me have ; 
and when he had thus spoken, he showed them his hands and his feet. And while 
they yet believed not for joy, and wondered, he said unto them. Have ye here any 
meat ? And they gave him a piece of a broiled fish, and of a honey comb ; and he took 
it and did eat before them.^^ — Luke xxiv. 88 — 43. 

Here is the positive proof that Christ was as real and corporeal after his 
resurrection as he was before. The body that was laid in the tomb by Joseph 
of Arimathea was the body that afterwards arose and appeared as " the same 
Jesus " — " I myself " — to the disciples. This is proof that the righteous in the 
resurrection wiU be as tangible and bodily as they are now, seeing that they 
are to be "fashioned lihe unto his glorious 'bodyT It is often suggested that 
Christ's nature was transformed into intangible essence after his ascension; but 
this supposition is so purely gratuitous and speculative as to be undeserving of 
consideration. It is easy to suggest a theory in order to get over a difficulty. 
Since there is no statement to the effect of the supposition in question, the only 



86 

rational alternative is to assume that no such change took place, and that 
Christ remained, and continues to he, the same real though glorified personage 
who exhibited his hands and feet to his assembled disciples. This legitimate 
assumption is borne out in the statement made by the angels to the disciples, 
just after the ascension. 

" "Uliy stand ye gazing up into heaven ? This same Jesun who is taken up from you 
into heaven, Bhall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven." 
—Acts i. 11. 

What would the disciples understand by " this same Jesus ? " "Would they 
not think of the blessed'Saviour who a few days before had eaten bread in their 
sight, and said to them, a " spirit (or phantasm) hath not flesh and hones as 
YE SEE ME HAVE ? " Undoubtedly ; and they would look forward to the time of 
his re-appearance, with the prints of the nails in his hands, and the mark of the 
wound in his side. Therefore, the proof remains that the righteous in the 
resurrected state will be as substantial as their Lord and Master, instead of the 
bodiless entities generally imagined. 

But though not less real than mortal man, the saints will possess a different 
Idnd of nature. They are, in the present state, "natural bodies," but are 
afterwards raised to " spiritual bodies." Here is the distinction. Natural or 
animal bodies are sustained in life by the blood. Hence, in Leviticus xvii. 14, 
we find the statement made, " The life of all flesh is in the blood thereof." The 
blood is the medium of animal vitality, it becomes charged with it by the 
action of the air on the lungs, and thus applies the life principle or " spirit " 
only in an indirect manner. The blood is proximately the life-giving agent ; 
hence, bodies sustained by it are simply blood bodies. Their life is not inherent ; 
it is conditional, and consequently fragile. It is applied by a process so delicate 
as to be easily marred by external influences and accidental circumstances. 
Therefore, life is uncertain, and constant health and vigour almost impossible. 
Our constitutions are easily impaired, and we are liable to be afflicted with 
infirmities and pain ; and hence has arisen a lucrative profession which professes 
to cure unfortunate humanity. The disease, however, is too deep for their skill. 
It is in the constitution, deep -grained and hujianly incurable, and aU that the 
doctor can do, is to patch and mend a humanly-unmendable mortality. The 
Lord Jesus Christ is the only true physician. He offers us resurrection to spirit- 
body existence. He promises to fashion us like unto his own glorious body. 
He imdertakes that though we may be afflicted with all the pains that flesh is 
heir to in this present life, and disfigured by all the distortions of horrible 
disease ; though we may die loathsome deaths, and be laid in the gTave a mass 
of festering corruption, yet we shall be raised to a pure and incorruptible state. 
Our bodies shall then be "spiritual bodies;" not because ethereality, whica 



87 

is not their characteristic, but because directly energised by the spirit of God, 
and filled in every atom with the concentrated inextinguishable life-power of the 
Highest. This is the testimony of Christ (John iii. 6) : " That which is bom of 
spirit IS Spieit." He had said, "that which is born of the flesh is flesh." 
Mortal men and women are born of the fiesh ; therefore they are but flesh — a 
wind that passeth away and cometh not again ; but let a man be " born of the 
spirit," and he is no longer the frail and perishable offspring of Adam. His 
corruptible has put on incorruptibility. He is an invincible, all-powerful, 
immortal son of God. "They are children of God," says Jesus, speaking of the 
resurrection which is unto life, " leing the children of the resurrection,'' Paul 
says (Eom. viii. 11), "He that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken 
your mortal todies by his spieit which dwelleth in you." Here is a second 
birth to be effected by the spirit of God ; and on the principle laid down by 
Christ, all who are the subjects of this operation of the spirit upon their mortal 
bodies, will be "born of the spirit," and therefore "spirit," or "siDiritual" 
bodies — bodies sustained in life by the direct operation of the spirit of life, 
without the intermediate agency of the blood — immortal, bloodless embodiments 
of the spirit in flesh and bones, like the Lord Jesus ; not necessarily pale and 
ghastly as a human body would be without blood, but beautiful with the 
electrical radiance of the Spirit which can show coloar otherwise than by blood, 
as witness the jasper and the ruby, and even the rainbow. Living by the 
thorough permeation of the life-spirit in the substance of their natures, they 
will be glorious and powerful, "pure as the gem, strong as adamant, and 
incorruptible as gold," glorious in the sense of physical luminosity, as 
exemplified in the Lord Jesus when he shone with the lustre of the sun on the 
mount of transfiguration, and according as it is .written — 

"And they that be wise zhall shine as the hrightness of the firmament, and they that 
turn many to righteousness, as the stars for ever and ever.^' — Dan. xii. 3. 

Powerful, in the sense of being vigorous and inexhaustible in the power of 
their faculties, as it is written — 

" The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, 
neither is weary. There is no searching of His understanding. He giveth power to 
the faint, and to them that have no might, He increaseth strength. Even the youths 
shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall; but they that wait 
upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings as eagles ; 
they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and notfaint.^^ — Isaiah xl. 28-31. 

Incorruptible, in the sense of being undecaying and imperishable in nature, 
and therefore entirely free from any liability to pain or disease. In this perfect 
condition, the righteous will have a boundless eternity before them — everlast- 
ing joy upon their heads ; no more dulness of mind ; no more fretting and 



heart-failing at the annoyances and uncertainties of mortal life ; no more sorrow, 
no more growing old ; no more passing away ; but all will be perfection, harmony 
unbroken, love unquenchable, joy unspeakable, and full of glory. This will 
be the happy state of the righteous ; this the consunmiation of that blessed 
promise, " The Lord God shall wipe away all tears from off all faces, and 
shall swallow up death in victory." — (Isaiah xxv. 8.) 

This precious life and immortality, brought to light by Jesus Christ through 
the gospel, is not to be indiscriminately bestowed. All men vrill not attain to 
it: only a few will be counted worthy. The precious gift is freely offered to 
all ; but it is conditional. It is not to be given to the faithless and the impure. 
Perfection of character must precede perfection of nature. Moral fitness is the 
indispensable pre-requisite, and God is the judge and the prescriber of the 
peculiar moral fitness necessary in the case. 

"To them who, by patient continuance in well-doing, seek for glory, honour, 
and immortality, eternal life."— Rom. ii. 7. 

"If thou wHt enter into life, keep the commandments:'— I)latt. xix. 17. 

''Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in 
you." — John vi. 53. 

"He that believeth on the Son, hath everlasting Ufe; and he that believeth not the 
Son, shall not see life."— John iii. 36. 

" These are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God, 
and that believing ye might have life through his name."— John xx. 31. 

* Go ye into aU the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that 
believeth, and is baptised, shaU be saved."— Mark xvi. 15, 16. 

^'He that heareth my word, and believeth on Him that sent me, hath everlasting Ufe, 
and shall not come into condemnation."— John v. 24. 

''He that believeth on me, though he were dead, yet shall he live."— John xi. 25. 

"1 will give unto him that is athirst, of the fountain of the water of life freelv »» 
— Rev. xxi. 6. ''' 

These testimonies give the death-blow to UniversaHsm. They predicate saJva- 
tion upon conditions which exclude the great majority of mankind They 
restrict it to a class which has always been microscopicaUy smaU among men, I 
and effectuaUy disprove the mistaken theory of benevolence which oroclaims I 
the "universal restoration " of every human being. This may represent Chrig. 
tianity as a very " narrow " affair, but no narrower than its divinely-intended 
scope. - Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way ; " this is its characteristic, 
and not without wisdom. The development of a chosen family from the sons 
of men is its object. The world's vast populations are merely incidental to this 



89 

plan. They come and they go ; and, as £esh, they profit nothing. They came 
from nothing, and go whence they came. It is only the theory of universal 
human immortality that gives rise to the idea of universal human salvation. 
When human nature is looked upon at its true standard of vanity, the difficulty 
vanishes ; on the other hand, if we look upon mankind as " immortal souls," it is 
impossible to exclude " universalism " from the thoughtful mind as the ultimate 
of Grod's eternal purpose ; for the mind cannot receive it that a G-od of wisdom 
and mercy should decree eternal cursing anguish as the lot of any of the 
creatures of His hand. Universalism, however, is clearly a fallacy. One error 
gives rise to another, and they both fall together. 

Those who are excluded from eternal life are divided into two classes — Ist, 
those who hear the word and reject it ; and 2nd, those whom circumstances 
preclude from hearing it at all — such as pagans of ancient times, and the 
natives of barbarous countries. The latter class include a third, viz., those 
whose misfortunes prevent them from believing, even if they heard the word, such 
as idiots and very young children. The fate of the first class is plainly stated. 
They are to be reserved for punishment ; for, as Paul says, 

" If the -word spoken by the angels was steadfast, and every transgression and 
disobedience received a just recompense of reward, how shall lue escape if we neglect 
80 great salvation ? " — Heb. ii. 2. 

The punishment is inflicted at the resurrection, for Jesus says " They that 
have done evil shall come forth to the resurrection of damnation,'" Thig 
*' resurrection to damnation," however, is not a resurrection to unending life. 
They shall, of the fiesh, to which they have sown, reap corruption (Gral. vi. 8), 
• which ends in the triumph of the worm and fire over their being — that is, in 
death. They rise to the shame and confusion of a divine and frovsTiing rejection, 
but having their "few stripes" or "many stripes," by which is probably 
meant differences in the duration and intensity of suffering, as justice may 
demand, the wicked are finally engulphed in "the second death," which 
obliterates their wretched existence from G-od's creation. Being of no use, 
they are put out of the way, and go to rest eternally, " where the wicked cease 
from troubling.'" This must have been evident from the numerous testimonies 
quoted in the last lecture ; but a paganized theology delights in assigning them 
an endless existence of torture. This idea is based upon certain obscure New 
Testament expressions which are supposed to countenance it, but which when 
properly understood, have a very different significance. " Unquenchable fire " 
does not imply the eternal conscious existence of the wicked, but the opposite : 
for if the fire is not quenched, then there is no escape from conmtmjtion. The 
phrase is used in this sense in Jeremiah xvii. 27, and Ezekiel AH 67. The same 
' is true of " worjn dieth not." Herod's wonns died not, and the consequence 



9C 



1 



was that he died. If tJicT/ had died, he would have recovered. " Everlasting 
punishment" is affirmed of the wicked; but this does not teach eternal 
torment. Aionian^ translated "everlasting," does not necessarily import 
unending perpetuity ; for of aion^ age, from which it is derived, Parkhurst 
observes, " It denotes duration or continuance of time, hut with great variety.'' 
Aionian, therefore, means age-pertaining, without fixing the duration, which 
is determinable by the scope of that of which it is affirmed. In the 
case before us, it is spoken of the punishment of the wicked. And 
as we know, from other parts of Scripture, that the punishment 
terminates in death, we are enabled to see that the "aion" of the punish- 
ment is only co-extensive with the duration of that punishment, short or long, 
as the case may be. 

Some imagine that the application of this principle to the phrase " eternal 
life" destroys the hope of immortality, by making it a thing of possible 
terminability ; but this is a mistake. True, if there were nothing beyond the 
phrase " eternal {aionian) life," we should have little foundation on which to 
build the hope of endless life. "We should then simply be informed that there 
was an age-pertaining life — a life pertaining to the coming age of God's 
intervention in human affairs, but should not, by the phrase, receive 
any information as to the nature of that life or the extent of its duration ; but, 
as from other testimonies, we learn that aionian punishment ends in death, so 
from other testimonies, we learn that the life to be conferred in that aion is 
inextinguishable. "Those who shall be accounted worthy to obtain that 
word . . . neither marry nor are given in marriage ; neither can 
THEY DIE ANY MORE, for they are equal unto the angels." — (Luke xx. 35-36.) 
"There shall be no moee death." — (Rev. xxi. 4.) " They shall never perish." 
— (John X. 28.) " He will swallow nj) death in victory.'" — (Isaiah xxv. 8.) " This 
mortal must put on immortality." — (1 Cor. xv. 53.) If immortality had an end, 
it would not be immortality. Aionian life is unending life. We know this, not 
from the use of the word aionian, which would teU us nothing on the subject, 
but from testimonies like those quoted. 

The second class of those who do not attain to life, are those who, never 
having seen the Hght, have never rejected it, and for that reason, cannot be liable 
to the judgment that awaits the impenitent. What is to be done with them ? 
It is common to suppose they will be among the saved ; but if darkness and 
unenlightenment be a passport into the kingdom of G-od, why did Jesus 
send Paul "to turn the Gentiles from darkness to light . . . that they might 
receive inheritance among them who are sanctified ? " If salvation in barbarism 
was certain, it would have been better to let them remain in ig-norance than 
to imperil their eternal destiny by the responsibilities of knowledge. We must 



91 

remember that tlie very circumstaiices that preclude the class in question from 
being rejectors of the Messiah, also prevent them entering the other class, 
and, therefore, keep them without the pale of conditional redemption. 
They have none of the responsibilities of the rejectors of the gospel, but none 
of the privileges of its enlightened and obedient believers. What, then, is to 
be done with them ? Paul answers the question in Romans ii. 12 : *' As many 
as have sinned without law shall also perish wiiliout law.'' Paganism, 
heathenism, idiotcy, and infantile incapability are amenable to no law. There- 
fore, resurrection does not take place in their case. Death has passed upon 
them under the only law they were ever related to, viz., the law of Adam ; and 
they sleep, never to be disturbed. Their position is described in the following 
passage from Isaiah xxvi. 14 : 

" They are dead, they shall not live, they are deceased, they shall not rise ; therefore, 
hast thou visited and destroyed them, and caused their memory to perish.'' 

A similar declaration is made in Jeremiah li. 57, in regard to the aristocracy 

of Babylon, who belonged to the identical class of whom we are speaking : 

" I will make drunk her princes and her v/ise men, her captains and her rulers, and 
her mighty men, and they shall sleep a perpetual sleep, and not wake, saith the 
King, whose name is the Lord of Hosts." 

God is just, and in this His justice is made manifest. He could not punish 
them with justice, and He could not reward them with justice ; therefore, He 
puts them aside. 

This completes the sum of what has to be advanced in reference to the 
conditional nature of immortality, as a gift to be bestowed at the resurrectic n. 
The proposition is plain, and the evidence conclusive. May it be the happy lot 
of all who read these pages, to inherit the glorious gift. 



LECTURE IV. (a.) 



JUDG3IENT TO COME, THE EISPENSATION OF LIVINE AWARBS 

TO MESFONSIBLE CLASSES AFTER ACCOUNT TAKEN 

AT TEE ADVENT OF CERIST 

THE common idea of ^'judgment to come," is that at a certain time, popularly 
known as "the last day," God will bring every human being to individual 
account, having first (if dead,) re-united his immortal soul to its form<;r tene- 
ment of clay. There is no exception to this rule in the orthodox mind, though 



92 

what use there is for a judgment day for anybody, if everybody's case is settled 
at death, it is difficult to see. " Heathens," pagans, barbarians of the lowest 
type, human brutes of all sorts, idiots, infants — every tody — absolutely every 
human soul that has ever had a being, in what condition soever it may have 
existed — according to current theology, will be resuscitated, and brought to 
account. With this idea, as with almost every feature of popular religion, the 
Bible is directly at issue. We have already given evidence of this at the close 
of the last lecture. Further evidence is found in David's description of tha 
position occupied by the ig-norant class. — (Psalm xlix. 6-20.) 

"They that trust in their wealth, and boast themselves in the multitude of their 
riches, none of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom 
for him (for the redemption of their soul is precious, and it ceaseth for ever) ; that 
he should still live for ever, and not see corruption. For He seeth that wise men die, 
likewise the fool and the brutish person perish, and leave their wealth to others. 
Their inward thought is that their houses shall continue for ever, and their dwelling- 
places to all generations . . . nevertheless, man being in honour abideth not, 
he is like the beasts that perish. This their way is their folly; yet their posterity 
approve their sayings. Like sheep they are laid in the grave; death shall feed 
on them ; and the upright shall have dominion over them in the morning." 

"Ye that fear my name shall tread down the wicked, for they shall be as^esuntfer 
the soles of yourfeet.^' — Mai. iv. 3. 

"And their beauty shall consume in the grave from their dwelling. But God 
will redeem my soul from the power of the grave ; for he shall receive me. Be not 
thou afraid when one is made rich, when the glory of his house is increased ; for 
when he dieth, he shall carry nothing away — his glory shall not descend after him, 
though while he lived, he blessed his soul: and men will praise thee when thou does;^ 
well to thyself ; He shall go to the generation of his fathers ; they shall never seu 
LIGHT. Man that is in honour, and understandeth not, is like the beasts that perish." 

It would be unreasonable to bring the brutish class to individual account 
Judgment has its basis in responsibility, and responsibility is purely a question 
of circumstances and capacity. Human beings in a state of barbarism may 
have the latent capacity to be responsible ; but this latent possession does not 
bring them within the category of responsible agents, for the simple reason 
that the actual condition of mind which gives the ground of responsibility does 
not exist. This is the case with children. They possess reason and moral 
capacity in the germ, but because these qualities are not developed, by universal 
law they are held not responsible. Is God less just than man ? 

Human responsibility to Deity primarily arises from human capacity to 
discern good and evil, and power to act upon discernment. Beasts are not 
accountable either to man or God, because they are destitute of the power to 
discriminate or choose. They act under the power of a bHnd impulse. Idiots 
are in the same category of irresponsible agents in the degree of their 
incapacity, and many men not considered idiotic are little better as regards 
their power of acting from rational choice. 



93 

The nature and extent of human amenability to a future judgment can only 
be apprehended in view of the relations subsisting between God and man, as 
disclosed in the history presented to us in the Scriptures. Apart from this, 
all is speculation, theory and uncertainty. Philosophy is at fault, because 
it discards the record. The fact recorded is simple and intelligible. The 
progenitor of the race was made amenable to consequences placed within the 
jurisdiction of his will. He was threatened with the cessation of being as the 
result of disobedience in a certain matter^ Disobedience occurred, and the law 
came into force : Adam and all his posterity came under the power of the law 
of sin and death, which was destined in their generation to sweep them away 
like wind and the grass of the earth. Had God intended no further dealings with 
the race, responsibility would have ended here. The grave-penalty would have 
closed the account; and human life, if indeed it had continued on the face of 
the earth in the entire absence of divine interposition, would have been the 
unredeemed tale of sorrow, which it is in the experience of those who are 
"without God and without hope in the world," unburdened, it may be, with 
future responsibilities, but unalleviated by the hopes and affections with which 
the day-spriug from on high hath visited us, and lightened this place of darkness. 

But in His great mercy, Jehovah conceived intentions of benevolence which 
He is working out in His own wise way. He did not — ^in haste and blunder, 
as our short-sighted and sceptical philosophers insist His goodness ought to 
have prompted Him to do, — at once and summarily, and without condition, 
reprieve the sentenced culprit. This would have been to overlook and violate 
those deep-laid principles of law, which guide all the Deity's operations, in 
"nature" and in "grace," and sustain the conditions of harmony throughout 
the universe. It would have been to perform a work not of mercy, but of 
destruction, confusion, and anarchy. The method of benevolence conceived in 
the divine mind was intended to work beneficence toward man, conformably 
with the law that had constituted him a death-stricken sinner, a law which 
involves " glory to God in the liighest " as well as "goodwill toward men." 
This intention necessitated those successive dispensations of His will which the 
world has witnessed in times past, and which have rescued both human exist- 
ence and human responsibility from the bottomless profound to which the law 
of Eden consigned them. The enunciation of Hia purpose in promise and 
prediction, and the declaration of His law in precept and statute, re-opened 
relations between God and man, and revived the moral responsibility which 
otherwise would have perished. It is, howeDer, a divine principle that this 
result is limited to those who come whthin the actual sphere of operations. 
*' Where no law is, there is no transgression."-— Rom. iv. 15. 
" II ye were blind " (that is ignorant), ' ye should have no sin,* "'^-John ix, 41, 



94* 

•* The times of this ignorance. God winked a^"— Acts xvii. 30. 

•* Man that is in honour and understandeth not, is like the beasts that perish." 
l?salm xlix. 20* 

" This is the (ground of) condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men 
lo^'C darkness rather than light."— John iii. 19. 

Hence in the absence of light — that is, when men are in a state of ignorance 
—they are not amenable to condemnation; God "winks at" their doings, 
just as he does at the actions of the brutes of the field. Barbarous nations 
are in this condition. They are without light and without law, and Paul's 
declaration on the subject is in harmony with the general principles enunciated 
in the Scriptures quoted: *' as many as have sinned without law shall slaope?'ish 
without law." — (Rom. ii. 12.) If to whom much is given, much is required, 
(Luke xii» 48,) it follows that to whom nothing is given, nothing shall be 
required, and to whom little is given, little is required in all the area over 
which the judgment operates. This principle of absolute equity in the matter 
of responsibility is exemplified in the words of Jesus* " If I had not come and 
spoken to them, they had not had sin,'' — (John xv. 22.) " The servant who 
knew his lord's will and prepared not himself, neither did according to nis will, 
shall be beaten with many stripes, but he that knew not and did commit 
things worz^% o/5^ri^^5, shall be beaten with few stripes*" — (Luke xii. 47.) 
*'He that eejecteth me and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth 
him, the word that I have sjpohen, the ".ame shall judge him in the last day." 
—(John xii. 48,) 

The operation of thesB principles i j iilostiated in the history of human expe- 
rience. From Adam to Noah, thera was but a little light. The promise of a 
seed by the side of the wcanan to CTOsh out the serpent principle of disobedience 
and its results, was almost the only st&r f>hat shone in the darkness of that 
time. Prophetic glimpses of the coming interference in its ultimate shape, such 
as those vouchsafed to Enoch (Jude 14), and the precepts of Noah, the preacher 
of righteousness, through whom the Anointing Spirit promulgated the divine 
principles to those who were disobedient (1 Peter iii. 18 — 20), added a little to 
the light of these times, but apparently not more than was sufficient to confer 
a titie to resurrection on those who laid hold on it by faith. So far as we have 
any information, no one became responsible to a resurrection of condemnation 
in pre-Noachic times. Responsibility was discharged with the penalties of the 
time. Cain reaped the bitter results of his crime in divine reprobation, ''known 
and read of aU," and went to the grave, doubtless, as a final "turning to dust 
again." Human wickedness, culminating in universal corruption, was visited 
with the almost total destruction of the species by a flood, which may be regarded 
•s lia\i^g been « wiadia^-up of «rll judicid questioas arising out of ^e precedirg' 



95 

period, so far as condemnation is concerned, and therefore as precluding from 
resurrection to judgment those who were the subjects of it. On this point, 
however, positive ground cannot be taken. Since resurrection unto life wiU 
take place in several cases belonging to that dispensation, it is not impossible 
that resurrection to condemnation may also take place among those who were 
obnoxiously related to that which gave the others their title, including the class 
specified in Enoch's prophecy — "the ungodly " who were guilty of "ungodly 
deeds and hard speeches " against Jehovah, and who must, therefore, have 
possessed the amount of knowledge necessary to constitute a basis of respon- 
bility. This must remain an open question, not because the principle upon 
which judgment will be administered is obscure, but because we have not a 
sufficient amount of information as to the facts of the time in question to 
enable us accurately to apply the principle. The principle itself, that respon- 
bility Godward, is only created by contact with divine law in a tangible 
and authorised form, holds good in every form of human relation to the 
Almighty. Noah's immediate family were within the pale of the divine 
cognition, and responsibility in reference to another life may arise out of that ; 
but their descendants wandered far out of the way of righteousness and under- 
standing, sinking below moral responsibility, degenerating to the level of the 
beast, and establishing those "times of ignorance" throughout the world, 
which we have Paul's authority for saying were "winked at," 

In the call of Abraham, the member of an idolatrous family, but who pos- 
sessed the latent disposition to be faithful, God arrested the tendency to repeat 
the universal corruption of antediluvian times. The germ of a more direct 
responsibility was planted among men by his election, and by the bestowal of 
promises upon him which had reference to the whole of the race. Abraham 
individually, while constituted a man of privilege, was also constituted a man of 
responsibility. Abraham, the idolator, was his own — ^his own to live, like the 
insect of the moment — his own to die and disappear in an irrecoverable grave. 
Abraham, the called of God, was no longer his own, but bought with the price 
of God's promises. He entered upon a higher relation of being. He was exalted 
to a higher destiny, and had imposed upon him Godward obligations, unknown 
to his former condition. Success or failure in the ordering of his life, was of 
much greater moment than before. Taith and obedience would constitute him 
the heir of the world, and the subject of resurrection to immortality : unbelief 
would make him obnoxious to a severer and farther-reaching displeasure than 
f eU upon Adam. In this respect, the children of Abraham by faith, that is, 
those "who walk in the steps of the faith which Abraham had, being yet 
uncircumcised " (Hom. iv. 12), who, being Christ's, are Abraham's seed (Gal. iiL 
29), through believing the Gospel and being baptised into Christ," areHke theii- 



96 

lather. Ey nature cHldren of wrath, even as others, they were in the days of 
their ignorance " without God and without hope in the world" (Eph. ii. 12), 
" strangers from the covenants of promise " (ibid), " aliens from the life of G-od, 
through the ignorance that was in them " (Eph. iv. 18), living without law, and 
destined, as the result of that condition, to perish without law in Adam; 
inheriting death without resurrection — death without remedy ; having neither 
the pii\T.leges nor the responsibilities of a divine relationship. But when called 
from darkness to light, by the preaching of the gospel, they are "not their own." 
They neither live nor die to themselves as formerly. They have passed into a 
special relationship to Deity — extra- Adamic — in which their HveSy good or evil, 
come under di\dne supervision, and form the basis of a future accountability, 
unknown in their state of darkness, at which God winked. This is neither 
more nor less than the responsibilities of Abraham, transferred to them on 
becoming his seed by adoption. 

The law of faith established by the promises made to Abraham, constituted 
a centre, around which responsibilities of this description developed themselves. 
All who acquired Abraham's faith came under Abraham's responsibilities. 
Doubtless, many entered this position in the course of the Mosaic ages. 
The law was added because of transgression (Gal. iii. 19), and tx., purpose of 
its addition is indicated in its being styled a schoolmaster. Its mission was to 
teach the first lessons of Jehovah's supremacy and holiness. It was not 
designed as a system through which men might acquire deliverance from 
Adamic bondage. Its purpose was purely preliminary and provisional, 
having reference to that result in its ultimate bearings, but not intended 
directly to develop it. Paul's comment on it is as follows: "If there had 
been a law V\ hich could have given life, verily righteousness would have been by 
the law." — (21.) It was impossible life could come by a law which required 
moral inf aUibHity on the part of human nature. For this reason, the law, 
though "holy, and just, and good'* (Eom. vii. 12), was "weak through the 
ilesh," and "though ordained to life," Paul "found it (from this cause) to be 
unto death." — (verse 10.) The consequence was, that " all the world stood 
guilty before God ; " and in that moral relation to Deity, they were precluded 
from boasting, that is to say, precluded from attaining to eternal life on a 
principle which would have left it open for them to think and to say that their 
life was their own by right as against the Deity. Prospectively considered^ 
this was a mighty triumph of divine wisdom ; for had immortal existence been 
attainable by self-acquired title, room would have been left for the admission 
of an element in the relations of God and man, which would have disturbed 
the perfect hannony that wiU exist where God is absolutely supreme, both in 
law and benevolence, and man is in the position of a love-saved brand from 
the burning. 



97 

The law of rigliteousnegs by faith, is the principle on which men are saved — - 
that is, saving righteousness is recognised or imputed by God where He is 
honoured by faith being exercised in what He has promised. This law came 
into operation with Abraham. Actually, it had its origin in Eden, for we read 
of Abel that by faith (the substance of things hoped for), he offered an accept- 
able sacriS-Ce. — (Heb. xi, 4.) The prediction of the woman's serpent- 
destroying seed, formed a pivot on which faith could work even then, and 
doubtless was the subject-matter of the faith which saved Abel, Enoch and 
Koah ; but the full and official initiation of the law of faith, as the rule of 
salvation, occurred in the history of Abraham. This law was the basis of 
resurrectional responsibility. The Mosaic law was national Its rewards and 
penalties were confined to the conditions of mortal life. It took no cognizance 
of, and made no provision for. Hie beyond the natural term of human exist- 
ence. In its ceremonial forms and observances, it symbolised the truth in 
relation to Christ and his mission, but in its proximate bearing upon the 
nation, it subserved no spiritual purpose beyond the continual enforcement of 
the schoolmaster lesson of Jehovah's supremacy and greatness. In this, how- 
ever, it established the greatest of first principles, and laid a foundation on 
which the Abrahamic law of faith could have its perfect work. 

Out of the law, as a national code, it does not appear any resurrectional 
responsibility arose. Yet concurrently with its jurisdiction, it is e^adent that 
a dispensation of God's mind, having referenee to resurrection, was in force* 
Undoubtedly this was subordinate, and occupied the place of an under- 
<)urrent ; but its existence is unquestionable, else how axe " Abraham, Isaac, 
and Jacob, and all the prophets," to appear in the kingdom of God ? If it be 
recognized that God's purpose from the beginning had reference to the mission. 
of the Ghrist as " The Eesurrection and the Life," there will be no difficulty 
in apprehending this conclusion. Obscurely it may be, but really it must be, 
that resurrectional responsibility was contemplated in all Jehovah did through 
His servants, from righteous Abel to faithful PauL Jesus has shown us that 
the very designation assumed by the Deity in converse with Moses at the 
bush, though apparently used for the simple purpose of historical identification, 
expresses the doctrine of resurrection in relation, at any rate, to Abraham, I&aac, 
and Jacob. God called Himself the God of men that were dead ; ergo^ reasoned 
Jesus — and that convincingly, for the Sadducees were put to silence — He intends 
to raise them from the dead. If so great a conclusion can warrantably be based 
on apparently so slim a -foundation, what may we not legitimately infer from 
the promise of a country to them they never possessed, and the assurance 
of the universal blessing of mankind in connection with thcni, which has 
never jet been realized P What but the conclusion affirmed by Paul that thej 



98 

*' died in faith, not having received tlie promises^'' and, therefore, that they must 
rise from the dead to realise them ? "With this general argument in view, it is 
easy to recognise resurrectional responsibility, in many expressions which a 
forced method of explanation alone can apply to the judgment of the present 
limited experience. — (Psalm xxxvii. whole of the chapter ; xlix. 14 ; Iviii. 10 ; 
Ixiii. 12; Prov. xi. 18, 31; Ecclesiastes iii. 17 ; v. 8; xi. 9; xii. 14; Isaiah 
iii. 10 ; xxvi. 19, 21 ; xxxv. 41 ; Ixvi. 4, 5, 14; Malachi iii. 16-18 ; iv. 1-3, (S:c." 
Jewish responsibility was greater than that of the cast-off descendants of the 
rejected groundhng of Eden, because their relation to Deity was special, direct 
and privileged. The responsibility originating in natural constitution, was 
supplemented by the obligations imposed by divine election, and arising out of 
the national contract entered into at Sinai, to be obedient to all that the Deity 
required — (Ex. xxiv. 3, 7) . This is recognised in the words of Jehovah by 
Amos, "You only have I known of all the families of the earth ; therefore 
will I jpiMsh you for all your iniquities'' — (Amos iii. 2). Yet there is no 
evidence that this responsibility takes the individual form which it assumes in 
connection with the individual privileges of the gospel. The national suffer- 
ings of the Jews, in dispersion and privation, are evidently (both on the face 
of the testimony and on a consideration of the moral bearings of the case,) a 
full discharge of the responsibility arising from national election. 

A responsibility lying in degree between that of the Jews and the outlying 
Gentiles, attached itself to those nations that were in contact with the Jewish 
people. This is evident on many pages of the prophets. Take, for instance, 
the words addressed to the king of Tyre : 

" Thou hast been in Eden, the garden of God ; . . . thou wast upon the 
holy mountain of God. Thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the ' stones 
of fire ' . . Because Tyrus has said against Jerusalem, Aha, she is broken that 
was the gates of the people ; she is turned unto me ; I shall be replenished now she 
is laid waste. Therefore, thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I am against thee, Tyrus, 
and will cause many nations to come up against thee, as the sea causeth his waves 
to come up — Ezek. xxviii. 13, 14 ; xxvi. 2, 3. 
Take, also, similar words addressed to Ammon, Moab, Edom, and Philistia : 
To AiMMON : " Because thou hast said Aha, against my sanctuary when itwasprofaned, 
and against the land of Israel when it was desolate, and against the house of Judah 
when they went into captivity, Behold, therefore, I will deliver tJiee to the men of the 
east for a possession," d-c. — Ezek. xxv. 3, 4. 

To MoAB : " Because that Moab and Seir do say, Behold the house of Judah is like 
unto all the heathen, therefore^ . , I will execute judgments upon Moab." 
Ex. xxv. 8-11. 

To EDOii: ^^ Because that Edom hath dealt against the hoiLse of Judah by taking 
vengeance, and hath greatly offended and revenged himself upon them, therefore, 
thus saith the Lord God, I will stretch out mine hand upon Edom," &c. — 12, 13. 

To Philistia: ** Because the Philistines have dealt by revenge, and have taken 
vengeance with a despiteful heart, to destroy it for the old hatred, therefore thus 
Baith the Lord God, I will stretch out mine hand against the Philistines," &c.— 15, 16. 



99 

Tt> none of tliese eases is there any evidence that G-od intends to mete out 
individual judgment br resurrection from the dead. It requires a high state 
of privilege before such can with justice be done. The majority of mankind, 
particularly ia the rude and barbarous times that required the schoolmaster 
lessons of the Mosaic law. wexe in circumstances of pure misfortune. Bom 
under condemnation in Adam, and left to the poor resources of the natural 
mind, which in all its history has never originated anything noble apairt from 
the ideas set in motion by "revelation."' they were as unable to elevate 
themselves above the level on which they stood as any tribe of animals. How 
just and merciful it was, then, of the Deity to " wink at *' *' the times of this 
ir:i:ri\ii:e " 'Arts svii. 30\ which alienated from the life of Grod (Eph. v. 18), 
:u_.i :-ll:— dr;l. jjider such circumstances, to pass awayHke the flower of 
the neld. that the place thereof might know it no more.— Psalm cin.. 15. 16.) 
On the supposition that every human being is an immortal souL such a line 
of action would, of course, be excluded, and t^ie circumstances of the early 
*• dispensations " would be altogether iaexpHcable. An immortal soul in the 
times of antiquity, would be worth as much as one now : and if it be wise and 
kind to save immortal souls now, there would seem a strange absenc-e of 
wisdom and Kneficence in the arrangement which, in these early ages, put 
salvation beyond their reach, and made their doom to hell-fire inevitable by 
the lack of those means of knowledge which are in our day accessible. If, to 
get out of this difficulty, it be suggested that man, in such a plight, will, in 
mercy be permitted to enter heaven, we are instantly compelled to question the 
value of our own privileges, nay, to doubt and deny the wisdom of the gospel, 
which, on such a theory, is not only not necessary to salvation, but a positive 
hindrance to it ; since by its responsibilities, it perils a salvatLon which, in its 
absenc-e, would l:.e certain. "We should also be compelled to deny the testimony 
of Scripture, that man having no understanding is like the beasts that parish, 
and that life and immortaHty have been brought to light by Christ through the 
Gospel. But we are not now deahng with the monster fiction of Christendom, 
We leave the immortality of the soul out of the accoimt, and deal with the 
question of judgment in the light of the fact that mankind is perishing under th^ 
law of sin and death, and, in Adam, has no more to do with a future state than 
the decaying vegetation which, year by year, chokes the forests and passes away 
with the winter. The endeavour is to realize, in the light of reason and Scripture 
testimony, the varying shades of responsibility created by the deahngs of the 
Almighty with a race already exiled from life and favour under the law of 
Eden. 

TTe have seen that resurrectional responsibility was limited to those who were 
related to the word of the Grod of Israel. The pronusea and precepts conferred 



100 

privilege and imposed responsibility having reference to resurrection. Tkey 
f onned a basis for that awakening from tlie dust to everlasting life, and shame 
and everlasting contempt, foretold to Daniel, and implied in many parts of the 
writings of Job, David, and Solomon. The extent to which they operate, it is 
neither possible nor important for us to determine^ The law of resurrectional 
responsibility operates much more vividly upon our own times, and it is the 
relation of this law to ourselves that we are more especially concerned to 
elucidate. 

It was left for him who proclaimed himself the Kesurrection and the Life to 
define clearly the relation of judgment to the great scheme of which he was 
the pivot and the means. He appears before us as the solution of the great 
difficulty which must have haunted the minds of the faithful men. of ancient 
times, in reference to the declaration that " God would judge the righteous 
and the wicked*" — (Eccles> iii» 17.) He exhibits in himself the method by 
which the arbitration of the unapproachable and immeasurable Deity is to be 
brought to bear upon mortal and finite man. The "Word made flesh proclaims 
himself the instrument and vehicle of divine judg-ment. He tells us that the 
Father hath committed all judgment to the Son (John v. 22), and that as no 
man can come to the Father but by him, so no one will be judged by the 
Father but in the light of the word which operates through him. — (John xii, 
48.) It is highly important that this fact should be distinctly recognised, 
because it is part of the truth concerning Jesus, which forms a prominent 
feature in the early proclamations of the gospel. This is evident from these 
testimonies : 1st, that in which Paul comprehends the doctrine of eternal 
(aionian) judgment among first principles (Heb» \i. 1) ; 2nd, the declaration 
of Peter : " He commanded us to preach uxto the people and to testify 
that it is he which was ordmned of God to he the judge of quick aito dead 
(Acts X. 42) ; 3rd, the statement of Paul that there is a " day when God shall 
judge the secrets of men by Christ Jesus, according to my (Paul's) gospel.'' — 
(Rom. ii. 16.) These general evidences are strengthened by the following 
testimonies, which we submit in detail on account of the importance of clear 
and Scriptural views on the subject : — 

'He that rejecteth me and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him; the 
word tliut I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.'' — John xii. 48. 

"As many as have sinned in the la-w, shall he judged by the law." — Rom. iL 12. 

" Every man's work shall be made manifest, for the day shall declare it, because it 
ehall be revealed by fire, and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is." — 
1 Cor. iii. 13. 

" The Father, without respect of persons, jiti^ef/i according io <v^ry wan'i w«r&."— 
1 Peter u 17* 



101 

^ The day of w:ratli and tlie revelation of the righteous judgmenl of God. who 
will render to every man according to his deeds . , in the day when God shall 
Judge tlie secrets of men by Jesus Christ." — Rom. ii. 5, 6, 16. 

"We shall all stand before the jud§ment-seat of Christ. . • Everyone of us 

' Shall give an account of himself to God*" — Eom. xiv. 10, 12. 

"Judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light 
the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts." — 
1 Cor. iv. 5* 

** We must all appear before the judgment-seat of Clifist, that everyone may reoeive 
the things in body, according to that he hath done, whether good or bad," — 
2Cor. V. 10. 

" The Lord Jesus Christ shall judge the quiclc and the dead at his appearing and liis 
kingdom." — 2 Tim. iv. 1» 

" It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this [that is when the death-state 
ends in resurrection] the judgment." — Heb. ix. 27. 

" Who shall give account to him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead."-* 
1 Peter iv. 5. 

*' That we may have boldness in the day of judgment,^' — ^1 John iv. IT- 

*'The time of the dead that they should be judged." — Rev> xi. 18. 

The proposition that judgment is one of the prerogatives and functions of 
the Messiah, thus stands upon a very broad Scriptural foundation, not merely 
as a fact, but as a constituent of the truth as it is in. Jesus. The bearing of 
the fact is apparent in connection with the mission of the Messiah, as related 
to our particular dispensation. This is briefly defined by Paul to be to " purify 
uato himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works," (Titus ii. 14), and by 
James, " to take out of the Gentiles a people for His name," The mode of 
accomplishing this work is the preaching of the gospel. An invitation has 
gone out to the ends of the earth, for people of any "kindred, nation, 
people, or tongue," to become servants of the Messiah, and heirs of tho 
kingdom which God has promised to them that love Him. Over the whole 
period of the times of the Gentiles, the number of these who respond to this call 
is considerable ; but all who are thus called are not chosen (Matt. xxii. 14), 
because many who accept the word preached, are not influenced by it to 
^'present their bodies living sacrifices, holy and acceptable." As in the case 
of the Israelites under Moses, " the word preached does not profit them, not 
heing mixed with faith " in all who hear it — (Heb. iv. 2). The soil being bad, 
the seed produces no result of any consequence. The net of the kingdom 
(Matt. xiii. 47) submerged (by preaching) in the ocean of "peoples, and 
multitudes, and nations, and tongues," encloses bad fish as well as good. The 
propagation of the gospel results in servants, faithful and unfaithful. Not 
<^J soj but there are different degrees of merit among those who are faithful. 



102 

Some sow bountifully ; others sparingly. Some bring forth fruit iLirty fold, 
and some an hundred fold. No man can assess the degrees. None o! the 
servants can say, This shall be accepted much, and that little, and the other not 
at all." In this matter, they are commanded to " judge not " (Matt. vii. 1), and 
indeed they cannot do it ; though, if censoriously inclined, they may attempt 
to do it, and sin. There are secrets unknown (good and evil) which require 
to be known most accurately, before a just judgment can be given. " Man 
looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart." — (1 
Sam. xvi. 7.) 

Here then is a great community, living and dead, every member related 
to the rest by the closest of ties, and yet each sustaining a problematical 
relation to the denouement upon which they have set their hearts — the attain- 
ment of immortality, and the inheriting of Grod's kingdom ; each having a 
right to the promised blessing, so far as the judgment of the rest is concerned, 
and yet each so situated with reference to God, that unfaithfulness wiU bring 
his damnation, though all his comrades approve. When and by what means 
is this endless variety of causes to be adjusted ? When and how is there to be 
a settlement of the account stiU open between the Deity and His servants ? 
which to man is simply inextricable, and impossible if extricated. Has God 
made any provision by which this superhuman task shall be accomplished ? — 
this balancing of good and evil in the infinite diversity of millions of " quick 
and dead?" — this determination of the minute shades of merit and demerit, 
attaching to the responsible dead and Kving of a hundred generations ? — this 
rewarding, in just ratio, of unknown and forgotten deeds of constancy and 
mercy ? — this exposure and retribution of evil thoughts, hidden malice, hard 
speeches, and deeds of darkness ? Has he arranged for such a scrutiny of the 
affairs of His people, as shall result in the separation of the evil from the good, 
the reward of the righteous and the punishment of the wicked among them ? 

The answer sometimes given to this question is true in the fact upon which 
it is built, but wrong in the construction of the fact. It is said that " the 
Lord knoweth theni that are His," and that, therefore, there is no necessity 
for a judgment ; that "He discemeth the thoughts and intents of the heart,'* 
and " needeth not that any should tell Him what is in man." This is true, 
and marks the difference between the * 'judgment-seat of Christ" and a human 
judicature, which makes inquisition /<9r the purpose of ascertaining the facts. 
But when this truth is made the means of displacing the necessity for the 
disclosed purpose of judging the quick and the dead, it is applied with an 
iUogical and pernicious result. It is illogical, because it by no means foUows 
that the Deity's omniscient perceptions are not to have official expressiony 
especially when, as in this case, those perceptions affect the standing of those 



I 



103 

who are the subjects of them, and determine, in the eicpressiorb of tfiem^ their 
destiny. In all transactions between man and the Deity, there is an invariable 
accommodation on the part of the latter to the necessities and finite apprehen- 
sions of the former. Why did Jehovah allow a faithless generation of Israelites 
to escape from Egypt under Moses, and go through the miraculous experiences 
of the desert, and finally pronounce condemnation on them, instead of acting 
on His knowledge, and summarily decimating them in a night, like the 
Assyrians, without warning or explanation ? Because He was anxious to bring 
down to human apprehension the methods of His moral procedure, which 
He could only do by acting on human modes and processes. Why did He 
allow Korah, Dathan and Abiram to lurk in the camp for a season, and 
trouble the congregation by attempting a rebellion against Moses and Aaron, 
instead of acting upon His omniscience, and weeding them out at the beginning 
of the journey, and so save the nation from turbulence? Because such a 
mode of procedure, instead of illustrating and justifying the ways of God to 
man, would have wrapped them in mystery, and clothed them with the 
appearance of caprice and injustice. Why did He so long forbear with the 
Jews in their obstinacy, foreknowing their ultimate rejection of all His 
messengers and His own Son? Why did Jesus, who discerned "spirits," 
tolerate Judas till he convicted himself by betraying his master ? Why did 
the Spirit suffer Ananias and Sapphira to come into the presence of the 
apostles, and go through the formality of hearing their own condemnation, 
before their mendacity was punished by death ? In fact, why do things happen 
at all as they do ? Why did not the Deity frame the terrestrial economy of 
things on such a basis that obedience and not disobedience should have been 
the law ? The whole history of divine procedure, in relation to human affairs, 
shews that divine omniscience is never allowed for a moment to f orestal or 
displace the natural order of events, but rather sets up and enforces the law by 
which everything has its full and logical course, before the culminating conse- 
quence is reached. This is observable in "nature," as weU as in "grace." 
The forces of the universe play upon each other in the evolutions of the results 
forecast in the divine purpose. The geological transformation of the globe is 
an illustration. To use a hackneyed but useful phrase, "God works by 
means." He works progressively, and by law. He is in strictest harmony 
with Himself in all the phases of His manifested power throughout His 
measureless domain. 

To say, then, that because God knows the righteous from the wicked, He will 
not bring them to the formality of a judgment, is to reason against every 
operation of Deity on record. It is true Deity knows ; but is it not necessary 
that the righteous and the wicked themselves should know ? How shall the 



104 

righteous know themselves approved, and the Tvicked condemned, and the 
Deity be justified in the eyes of both, without the declaration of what Ha 1 
knows ? The conclusion is, therefore, in the highest degree illogical. 

It is also pernicious, because it involves the rejection of one of the doctrines I 
"which are defined as the first principles of the doctrine of the Christ, "We have 
quoted testimony sufficient to show that the doctrine of the judgment of tho 
living and dead by Christ is part and parcel of the gospel-proclamation about I 
him. We further submit, on the strength of considerations already passed in 
review, that, logically viewed, it is a natural and necessary part of the glad 
tidings. It is one of the finest sources of reHef which the truth affords, the 
knowledge that the disputes, misunderstandings, and wrongs of the present 
maladministration of things, are destined, in the purpose of God, to como 
before an infallible tribunal, at which every man shall have praise or con- 
demnation, according to the nature of the disclosure. It is gladdening to 
know that there lies between this corrupt state of things and the perfection of 
the kingdom of God, an ordeal which will prevent the entrance of " anything 
that defile th," which, as fire, will try every man's work, and thin down, by a 
process of purification, the crowd of those who do no more than say " Lord, 
Ijord ! " It is comforting to know that wrongful suffering will then be 
avenged, that secret faithfulness will then be openly acknowledged, that 
unappreciated worth will be recognized, and that evil doing, unpunished, 
unsuspected, and unknown, will be held up for execration, in the face of so 
august an assembly as that of the Elohim, presided over by the Lion of the 
tribe of Judah, This is part of the glad tidings concerning Jesus Christ. 
Woe be to him who lifts the voice of denial against it ! 

In these remarks, we assume that the object and effect of the judgment is to 
mete out to every man who is summoned to it, according to his deeds, whethee 
GOOD OE BAD, This is apparent from the testimony quoted to prove that 
judgment will be executed by the Son of Man at his coming. We append 
further and more specific evidence on this point : — 

" The work of d man shall he render unto him, and cause every man to find 
according to his ways."— Job xxxiv. 11. 

" Doth not He that pondereth the heart consider ? and He that keepeth thy soul, doth 
not He know? and shall not He render to Everyman according to his works?" — Prov, 
xxiv. 12.— See also Psalm Ixii, 12. 

*' 1, the Lord, search the teart ; I try the reins, even to gjve every man according 
to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings."— Jeremiah xvii. 10. 

" Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, . . . And then will I profess unto 
them, I never knew you; depabt FROii me, ye that work iniquity."— Matt. vii. 22, 23. 

" Every idle (evil) word that men shall speak, they shall give account tliereqf in tbt 
da^ of Ju<^m€nt,"—M&tL xii. 36, 



105 

**The Son of Man sliall come in the glory of his Father with his angels; and 
then he shall reward every man according to his works." — Matt. xvi. 27. 

" Every one of us shall give account of himself to God."— Eomans xiv. 12. 

"Whose fan is in His hand,and He will thoroughly purge His floor,and gather his wheat 
into the garner, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire." — Matt. iii. 12. 

"Behold I come quickly, and my reward is with me, t^give every man according as 
his work shall &e."— Eev. xxii. 12. 

Another important evidence of the conclusion to which these testimonies lead 
us, is to be found in the parables of Christ, in many of which he illustrates the 
relation between himself and his servants in connection with his departure from 
the earth. In aU of these, he presents the fact that at his return, he will "take 
account" of them, and deal with them according to their individual deserts. 
Thus, in the parable of the nobleman (Luke. xix. 15), " It came to pass that 
when he was returned^ having received the kingdom, he commanded these 
servants to he called unto him to whom he had given the money^, that he might 
KNOW HOW lycTJCH EYEEY MAN HAD GAINED BY TEADiNG." Thosc Servants are 
given as three in number, and, doubtless, represent the several classes of which 
the bulk of Christ's professing servants are composed. The first gives a 
satisfactory account of himself, having increased five talents to ten, and 
receives jurisdiction over ten cities. The second had made two talents into 
four, and entitled himself to meritorious recognition and the allotment 'of four 
cities. The third, who though less privileged, might have stood equally well, 
had he turned his single talent into two, justifies his indolence on the plea that 
he dreaded a service where more was expected than was given in the first 
instance. This man, who stands for the unfaithful, is rejected. The decree is 
" Take the talent from him, and give it unto him that hath ten talents . 
Cast ye the unpeofitable seevant into outer darkness." — (Matt. xxv. 28, 30.) 
Here the unprofitable servant figures in the judgment of the king's household, 
at his return, as well as the approved. In Matt. xxii. 1-14, we have another 
parable in which the same feature is introduced. A certain king issues invita- 
tions to his son's marriage, but the parties invited make various excuses for not 
coming. The king then orders a general invitation to all and sundry whom 
his servants may find on the highways, and his servants execute the orders, 
and ^' gather as many as they found, had and good J'' The king then comes in 
to see the guests, and " saw there a man which had not on a wedding garment y^ 
whom he ordered to be " hound hand- and foot, and tahen away^ This shows 
that the judgment to be carried out by Jesus at the time of reckoning has the 
practical effect of '-'- severing the wiched from amongst the just'' To the same 
purport is the parable of which the latter italicised words are an explanation. 
*' The kingdom of heaven is Uke unto a net that was cast into the sea, and 



106 



1 



gathered of every kind, wliicli wlien it was full, they drew to tlie shore, and 
sat down and gathered the good into vessels, and cast the lad away. — (Matt. 
xiii. 47, 48.) Also the following : " The Son of Man is as a man taking a farM 
journey, who left his house and gave authority to his servants, and to everyfl' 
man his work, and he commanded the porter to ' watch, therefore, . 
lest coming suddenly, he find you sleeping.' " — (Mark xiii. 34, 36.) Further: 
*' Let your loins be girded about and your lights burning, and ye yourselves 
like unto men that wait for their lord, when he will return .... 
Blessed are those servants whom the Lord when he cometh shall find watching, 
But, and if that servant say in his heart, my lord delayeth his 
coming, and shall begin to beat the men-servants and maidens, and to eat and 
to drink and be drunken, the Lord of that servant will come in a day when he 
looketh not for biTti^ and in an hour when he is not aware, and will cut him 
asunder^ and will a_pj)oint him his portion with the unbelievers.'" — (Luke xii. 35, 
45, 46.) The parable of the ten virgins enforces the same fact, viz., that the 
unworthy portion of his servants will be publicly and of6.cially rejected at the 
time the others are acknowledged. 

This is in harmony with the reason of the thing, as well as with the numerous 
testimonies already cited from the apostolic writings. Many are called, but 
only few out of many are to be " chosen." When should the choice take place, 
but at the time represented in these parables, viz., *' When the lord of those 
servants cometh" to develop the state of things in reference to which the 
choice is to be made ? — (Matt. xxv. 19.) The present is not a time for dividing 
the wicked from the righteous. Both go to the grave, and " rest together in 
the dust," and their merits and demerits would sleep for ever with them in the 
silence of the tomb, were it not for the awaking voice that calls the just and 
unjust, at the appointed time, from the oblivion of hades^ to give an account 
before *'the judgment-seat of Christ." Now is not the time for Jesus to execute 
judgment. He is a priest over his own house. The great question of account 
is left over till he returns. ^^ He shall judge the quick a7id the dead kt Bi^ 
APPEARING AND HIS KINGDOM." He shall Open the dread book of God's 
remembrance, wherein are indelibly recorded the thoughts and transactions of 
those who shall come to judgment, and the dead shall be judged out of those 
things that are written in the book. 

Shall the wicked be absent at such a moment ? The suggestion is for ever 
precluded by the testimony and by the sense of the thing, A mockery of a 
judgment-seat it would be if its operations were confined to the allotment of 
rewards to the accepted. To judge, in the executive sense, is to enforce the 
division of good from evil. Tliis is the function of Jesus in relation to his 
servants at his coming. True, says the suggestor, but it will only be the living 



107 

wicked that he will reject ; the dead wicked will sleep on to another periods 
Is it so, then, that the accident of death a day before the advent will shut off 
a wicked man from the Jurisdiction of the Judge of the quick and dead "? Is it so 
that Jesus will only judgetheHving^?i<^/z<?2^ Me ^d*^^ at his appearing? Isit so that 
he is not "lord both of the dead and Hying ? " — (Rom. xiv. 9.) The answer is 
self-evident ; life or death makes no difference in our relationship to the 
judgment-seat. The Son of Man has power to call from the dead at his will, 
and, therefore, virtually, the dead are as much amenable to his judicature as 
those who may happen to be in the flesh when he is revealed. The constituted 
servants of Christ — by belief of the gospel and baptism — are candidates for 
the kingdom to be manifested at the appearing of Christ, which is to exist 
thereafter a thousand years ; and it is meet that they should be arraigned in 
his presence to have it decided, as between them and him, when the time comes 
to enter the kingdom, which of aU their number are worthy of the honour 
sought. This it is declared, in the testimonies quoted, he will do. To do 
otherwise, to leave over the undeserving of them for adjudication at a 
subsequent period, would both violate the fitness of things, and contravene the 
express declarations which we have quoted on the subject. Jesus has declared 
that he vsdll confess or deny men in the presence of the angels at his coming, 
according to the position taken by them in his absence. — (Luke ix, 26 ; Matt, 
X. 32, 33.) Does not this necessitate their presence on the occasion ? Where 
would be the shame of a denial if the one denied were not there to witness his 
own disgrace? Some will be "ashamed before him at His coming, "" — ■ 
(1 John ii. 28.) Daniel says that at that time "Many of them that sleep in 
dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting Hfe, and some to shame and 
everlasting contempt''' This agrees with Paul's statement that "indignation 
and wrath, tribulation and anguish," shall be the lot of every "soul of man 
that is contentious and disobedient to the truth, in the day wlien God shall 
^ndge the secrets of men ly Christ Jesus-:,'' — (Rom. ii. 6, 9, 16 ;) and ^dth his 
exhortation in another place, to " judge nothing before the time till the Lord 
come, who will hinng to light the hidden things of darkness,' ' — (1 Cor. iv. 5.) 

With the general conclusion before us, that the judgment seat is the 
appointed tribunal for determining the great question of individual desert, in 
relation to the dispensation of God's favour in Christ, we come to the minor but 
involved question of the nature and position of the dead, during the interv^al 
elapsing between their emergence from the death-state and their adjudication 
by the judge. The object of that adjudication is defined by Paul in the follow- 
ing words; "We must all stand before the judgment seat of Christ, that we ma if 
receive in body according to that we have done, whether good or bad." — 
(2 Cor, v, 10.) What shall those "receive in body," who have in the sense of 



108 

these words, "done good?" and what, those who have "done bad?" Paul, in 
another place, answers these questions. He says God will render to every 
man according to his deeds: to them who patiently continue in 7veU doing 
(he will render) eternal life. But unto them that are contentious, and do 
not obey the truth, indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish 

in the day when God shall judye the secrets of men by Christ 
Jesns — (Kom. ii. 6, 9, 16). The same fact he announces in more specific 
terms to the Galatians (vi. 7, 8), "Be not deceived, God is not mocked; what- 
soever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. He that soweth to the flesh shall 
of the flesh r^^jD corruption] but he that soweth to the spirit shall of tlie 
spirit reap life eveelastixq." Paul does not mention the judgment in this 
testimony; but it is evident that it relates to the judgment, since life everlasting 
is not "reaped" in the present state of existence, and "corruption" befals all 
alike, without reference to the "sowing." It is evident that the results of 
the present life are to be dispensed at the judgment-seat. Paul, indeed, expressly 
declares it in the words already quoted, " that we may receive," &c. This is 
reasonable, and befitting of the Deity, who is " a God of order " to the utmost 
exactitude in all things. If this be so, does it not follow that, prior to the 
judgment seat, both classes of those subject to judgment occupy the neutral 
position they hold in the present Life, commingling indiscriminately, awaiting 
the tribunal, none knowing who is who ? Is it not evident that the judgment 
seat forms the great natural boundary line between probation and exaltation: 
the great crisis for determining the standing of the many who have been 
"called?" The time for that disclosure of divine secrets, which results in the 
severing of the wicked from among the just, and the rejection and condemna- 
tion of the one, and the acceptance and glorification of the other ? If so, it 
follows that up to the appearance of the dead before Christ to give an account, 
these questions are undecided, so far as their effect in relation to them is 
concerned. They are, of course, known to the divine mind, as we have already 
had- occasion to consider, but not declared or enforced. Christ, as the ludge of 
quick and dead, is entrusted with that very duty. 

"What is the conclusion from these Scriptural premisses ? There is only one ; 
that the dead assembled for judgment are men and women in the flesh recovered 
from the grave, reproduced, and made to "stand again" (anastasis) in the 
presence of their Lord and Judge, to have it determined whether they are 
worthy of receiving the "hidden manim" of eternal life, for which they are aU 
candidates, or deserving of reconsignment to corruption and death, under the 
specially solemn circumstance of rejection by him who is "altogether lovely." 
Thus, those who are alive when the Lord comes, and those who emerge from 
the grave at that period, will be on a footing of perfect equality. They wiU 



109 

all be gathered together into the one G-reat Presence, for the one great and 
dread purpose of inquisition. Not until they hear the spoken words of the 
King will they know how it is to fare with them. All depends upon the 
"account." This can only be accurately estimated by the judg'e. A righteous 
man will tremble and underrate his position ; on the other hand, one of the 
"wicked" may venture with coolness and effrontery before that august tribunal, 
to recount with complaisance and confidence the list of his claims to the 
Messiah's consideration: "Have we not prophesied [preached] in thy name, 
and in thy name done many wonderful works?" 

It is evident from three things — from the reason of the thing, from Christ's 
parables, and Paul and Peter's statements — that the judgment will be no dumb 
show, no wholesale indiscriminate division of classes, but will be an individual 
reckoning, "Everyone of us shall give account of himself to God." — (Rom, 
xiv. 12.) It may be fancied that persons before the judgment-seat would 
simply be paralysed and rendered powerless to utter their minds ; but it must 
be remembered that the power is then and there iDresent that touched Daniel, 
and made him stand on his feet, when he was felled to the earth by the terrors 
of angelic presence ; and, doubtless, this power will be put forth to enable all 
calmly, clearly, and with deliberation to state their case for decision. 
Enswathed by the human spirit " mesmerically" applied, this result can now 
be partially achieved ; how much more when the power of the highest sustains, 
will those who are acted upon by it, feel isolated from ail perturbing infiuences, 
and be enabled to concentrate their minds upon the solemn task they have to 
perform. 

The idea that the righteous dead will spring into being in a state of 
incorruption, and that the living faithful will be instantaneously transformed, 
in their scattered places throughout the earth, and changed into the spiritual 
nature before appearing m. the presence of Christ, (though apparently 
countenanced by testimonies which are superficially construed by those who 
so read them) is an error of a serious complexion, since it practically sets aside 
the New Testament doctrine of the judgment (itself a first principle), and tends 
to destroy the sense of responsibility and circumspection induced by a recognition 
of the fact that we must all stand before the judgment-seat of Christ, that we 
may receive in body according to that we have done, whether good or bad. To 
profess a belief in the judgment while holding this view, is only to retain a 
form of words out of deference to New Testament phraseology, while having 
lost that which is represented by the words. If the dead are to awake to 
incorruptibility or death, according to their deserts, Jesus is robbed of his 
honour as judge, and the judgment- seat is robbed of its utility and its terror. 
If the living are to be subject to immortalization, say in their own houses, 



110 



1 



before Christ pronounces tliem blessed, is the judgTaent-seat not a mere empty 
fc>rm ? If (worse than all) the wicked are not to be there to hear and receive 
their doom, it is no judgment at all, but a mere muster of the chosen ; no terror 
at all, but a ceremony divested of every element of anxiety, since to have a 
part in it, according to this theory, is to be safe beyond miscarriage ; no 
rendering at all to every man according to his deeds, whether yood o^ had; but 
a mere bestowal of gifts and honours upon the King's assorted friends. Yet 
this is the mistaken view which many are led to entertain by a superficial 
reading of certain parts of the apostolic testimony. "We shall consider those 
passages in detail. 

1 Thess. iv. 16. The JDmd in Christ shall eise fiest. — A reference to the 
context will shew that the comparison implied in these words, is between the 
dead righteous and the living righteous, and not between the righteous dead 
and the wicked dead. The Thessalonians were apparently mourning the death 
of some of their number in a way that indicated a fear on their part that the 
deceased had lost something by dying. Paul assures them that this was a 
mistake. ""We who are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord, shall 
not prevent (or go before) them who are asleep, for the Lord himseK shall 
descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and the 
trump of God, and the dead in Christ shaU. visejirst. Then (or second) we who 
are alive and remain shall be caught up," &c. Paul simply means to teach 
that the dead are restored to life and perfected before the living enter upon the 
inheritance, and that therefore the dead lose nothing by dying. " Wberef ore," 
says he, " comfort one another with these words." 

^^ Blessed and holy is he that hath i^art in the first resurrectiofi ; on such, 
the second death hath no lyower''' — (Rev. xx. 6.) It is argued upon this that 
none of the wicked can be raised at that time. This appears to follow, but it 
does not follow. What is it " to hsiYe part in the first resurrection ? " The word 
translated " part" is meros^ and this is defined by Parkhurst to mean " a piece, 
part, portion, fellowship, lot," &c. ; hence to have part in the first resurrection, 
is to have " a piece, part, portion, fellowship, or lot," at the coming of Clirist. 
There will be many at the judgment-seat who will be dismissed without a 
*' piece, part, portion, lot, or fellowship." The King will refuse to own them^ 
On such the second death hath power, but on those who attain to the condition 
of things that John witnessed and described as ^'the first resurrection," viz., 
a living and reigning with Christ a thousand years — " the second death hath 
no power." As Jesus says ^^ Neither can they die any more^ for they are equal 
\into the angels." 

They mho shall he accounted worthy to obtain that 7vorld and the n'ESTmsEcnO'sr 
FEOM THE DEAD, neither marry nor are given in marriage^ .^'<?.— (Luke xx. 35.) 



Ill 

On tlifc strength of this it is contended that the unworthy will not come out of 
the grave at the time the worthy come forth to ^'obtain that world." The 
argument is based on a misconstruction of the verse. *' The resurrection from 
the dead " is something more than the act of rising from the grave. " Resur- 
rection " involves the act of rising from the dust, but comprehends more than 
this in many parts of the 'New Testament, For instance, the Sadducees asked 
Jesus, "In the Resubrection, whose wife shall she be?" — (Matt. xxii. 28) 
that is, in the state to which the dead will rise. How would the question read 
if construed "whose wife shall she be in the act of rising from the grave ? " 
Again, " In the Eestjeeection they neither marry nor ar^ given in marriage^'* 
(Matt. xxii. 30,) that is, in the state to which the dead rise. Again, "they that 
have done good (shall come forth) to the resurrection of life, and they that have 
done evil to the resurrection of condemnation ; " that is, one class come out of 
the grave to one resurrection-state, and the other to another resurrection-state. 
It is testified that Paul preached Jesus and the resurrection. — (Acts xvii. 18.) 
This could not mean that Paul simply preached the act of rising from the 
grave. The mere act of rising from the grave is not necessarily a good thing. 
Lazarus and the son of the widow of Nain rose from the grave, but not to the 
resurrection (state) preached by Paul. They merely received a renewal of 
mortal life. The wicked of a certaia class will rise from the grave, but the act 
of rising will not be to them a gladsome event, but the contrary ; they would 
prefer to be left in the oblivion of the tomb. Everything depends upon the 
STATE to which the rising from the grave is the introduction. Paul preached 
the resurrection-state of incor ruction and immortality. To this state the dead 
have to rise. The mere act of rising is not the resurrection. It is involved 
in it ; it is a part, but as employed in the Scriptures, it requires the state after 
coming out of the grave to be added, before the idea expressed by the word 
resurrection is complete. Another illustration of this is to be found in a passage 
on which the opponents of this idea rely ; "i saw thrones, and they sat upon them, 
and judgment was given unto them ; and I saw the souls of them that were 
beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had 
not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark 
upon their foreheads or in their hands, and they lived and reigned with Christ a 
thousand years. But the rest of the dead lived not again tiU the thousand 
years were finished. This (what ? The state of things that John witnessed— 
the reigning of the accepted for a thousand years)— This is the fiest 
EESUEBECTiON."— (Rev. XX. 4, 5.) There is no mention of the act of coming 
out of the grave. John merely sees certain persons who had been dead, 
occupying a certain position with Christ ; and, describing the scene as a whole, 
he calls it the fiest eesueeection. Evidently the word resui-rection cannot 



112 

here be restricted to the act of rising from the grave. Many will have a parfc 
in it who will never go into the gTave at all, viz., " those who are alive and 
remain." " Resm-rection " here broadly covers a state and a time to which 
the persons seen are introduced by rising from the death-state, whether in that 
state they are below the sod or walking above it in mortality. But both living 
and dead wiU have to appear before the judgment-seat, before they take the 
position in which John saw them, and when they appear at the judgment-seat, 
they will have companions whom they wiU never see again, for to some Christ 
will " say unto them in that day, I never knew you ; depart from me ye that 
work iniquity." — (Matt. vii. 22, 23.) Such will be asha-mt.d before him ai his 
coming. — (1 John ii. 28 ; Dan. xii. 2.) 

But the principal obstacle is found in the words " The rest of the dead lived 
not again tiU the thousand years were finished." This is assumed to apply to the 
unfaithful servants of Christ, but this is evidently a mistake, because at the time 
when that is developed which John styles the "fij-st resurrection," viz., a living 
and reigning with Christ, the judgment which disposes of the unfaithful and 
rewards the worthy, is past. The "rest of the dead " cannot apply to the unfaith- 
ful amenable to the judgment-seat of Christ, inasmuch as if they were raised at 
that time, their resurrection and condemnation are accomplished facts at the time 
when these words are used. If they apply to a specific class, it is a class not 
amenable to the judgment which Jesus brings to bear on his household, and a 
class undealt with tiU the close of the thousand years. Possibly, it may refer 
to men like Nero, and others gTeat in wickedness, who are unpunished in the 
present life, and who, though outside of specific law to God, have acquired a 
degree of moral responsibility by external contact with divine things. Kejectors 
of the Tv^ord, who do not come under law to Christ by belief and obedience, 
may be reserved till the close of the thousand years. It does not seem 
reasonable that those who put away the counsel of God from themselves should be 
passed over without judgment, and yet, since they do not become constituents 
of the household of faith, their resurrection, at the time when account is taken 
of that household, would be inappropriate. May they not be dealt with at the 
end ? This may be the significance of the language under consideration. It 
may have a more general meaning than this, viz., that there is to be no further 
resurrection of dead people till the end of the kingdom ; that though power to 
raise the dead is upon earth for a thousand years, it is not to be exercised till 
the close of that period. This would not necessarily mean that there are 
people left over from the present and previous dispensations, who will be called 
forth at the end of a thousand years. It may only be intended to teach that the 
remainder of the dead divided from this dispensation by the advent, and related 
entirel}- to the dispensation of the kingdom, wiU not be dealt with till the close 



I 



lis 

of the kingdom, when the resurrection will, possibly, be confined to those who 
live and die nnder the reign of Christ. All that it really proves is, that there is 
to be a resurrection of dead people at the end of the thousand years (and from 
the sequel of the chapter we learn that a class of these will enter into life). We 
cannot be certain whether its bearing is retrospective or prospective, whether 
it relates to people actually in death when the saints begin to reign, or to the 
dead comprehensively of whom a remainder will exist during all the thousand 
years. This much is certain, that it is not intended to teach, and, as we have 
seen, does not teach that there will be no resurrection of unjust at the coming 
of Christ. No one part of the Scriptures can violate the unequivocal testimony 
of other parts. To admit of the common interpretation of Rev, xx. 6, would 
be to abandon the great doctrine of Judgment with which the Scriptures 
(the New Testament niore particule^rly) teem in an emphatic form. 

" So also is the resurrection of the dead. It is sown in corruption^ it is faised in 
incorruption-, it is sown in dishonour, it is raised in glory \ it is sown in weakness 
it is raised in power ; it is sown a natural hody, it is raised a spiritual body . «, 
The dead shall he raised incorruptiMeJ' — (I Cor. xv. 42-44, 52.) These words 
constitute the great stumbling-block with those who deny the judgment of the 
saints. Restricting them to the mere act of emergence from the ground, they 
naturally regard them in the light of an express affirmation that the body is 
incorruptible, spiritual, and immortal from the first moment of its restoration ; 
and that, therefore, judgment is anticipated and superseded by this silent 
proclamation of acceptance, and that nothing lies between those thu-s rising 
incorruptible, and perfected salvation, but a joyous re-uuion with the Lord* 
The mistake consists in construing Paul's words too narrowly, and reading 
them as if he were dealing with the dramatic incidents of the resurrection, 
instead of the state of existence to which the act of resurrection leads. Paul 
is not discussing the sci-entific aspect of the subject. He is not defining the 
process by which a dead man ascends from the depths of corruption to the 
nature of the angels ; the literal details are foreign to the subject before his 
mind. He is dealing with the broad question propounded by the objector; 
first, how — ^^as a question of possibility — are the dead raised ? and second, for 
or to (" with " not being in the original) what body do they come ? The first 
point he disposes of by an appeal to a phenomenon which exemphfies the 
power of resurrection organically exerted ; and the second he meets by 
challenging attention to the fact that there is great diversity of power and 
glory in the universe of G-od, and that dead people, in a future state, need not 
necessarily, therefore, be the corruptible flesh and blood they are in mundane 
life. This being' so, "raise" must be taken in its widest sense, including, of 
necessity, the act by which the dead first resume bodily form and conscious- 



114 



^ 



ness, but, at the same time, covering the whole process, nvliaiexer it may le, 
which leads to incorruption. It could not be that Paul intended to exclude any 
part of the process. It is doubtful if the question of process was at all 
present to his mind. This is suggested by the entire absence of allusion either 
to the judgment or the unfaithful. It was the broad question he looked at, 
viz., the position of those destined to be accepted, in relation to the two facts, 
that they are to see corruption, and that God intends to promote them, in a 
renewed existence, to an incorruptible and immortal state. Paul affirms that 
as there is a difference of nature in different orders of being, and a difference 
between heavenly and earthly glory, so there is a difference between the present 
and the future constitution of the saints, because the present is the earthly 
and the future the heavenly ; the present the animal and the future the 
spiritual. The characteristics of the present state — of which death is but the 
conclusion — are corruption, dishonour, weakness, and naturality; from this 
the body will emerge at the resurrection, in incorruption, glory, power, and 
spirituality. Tliis is true, without at aU involving the conclusion that at the 
precise moment existence is resurrectionally renewed, the saints will be in 
possession of these qualities. The resurrection, as a complete transaction, 
inclusive of the judgment-seat of Christ, will, in the case of the righteous, 
ultimate in incorruption, glory, power, and immortality. In a sense, they will 
attain to these on emerging from the ground, since they will never return 
to corruption ; but, actually, they will be in the neutral state, to be determined 
for good or evil by judgment. Paul, however, does not take this into account. 
He is not treating of details. He overleaps every item in the programme, and 
looks broadly at the fact that the destiny of the righteous, by resurrection, is 
the swallowing up of death in the victory of immortality. 

The word " raise " is used elliptically in Matt. iii. 9 ; Luke i. 69 ; and Acts xiii. 
22, 23. That Paul is dealing with his subject eUipticaUy is evident from another 
part of the chapter. He introduces Adam and Christ in proof of his proposition 
that " there is a natural body and a spiritual body." He quotes the record of 
Moses with reference to Adam in proof of the existence of a natural body. " The 
first man, Adam, was made a living soul " (or natural body). His proof of the 
second lies in this : " the last Adam was made a quickening spirits Now 
supposing a person, ignorant of the history of Christ, were to receive Ms 
impressions of Christ's history from this statement — supposing he had no other 
source of information — would he not come to the conclusion that the *' last 
Adam" was a spiritual body from the first moment of his existence ? "Would 
he ever conclude from it that "the last Adam" was first a helpless babe at 
Betlilehem, clad in the flesh-and-blood-nature of his mother; then a boy, 
eubmissive to his parents ; then a carpenter, helping in the workshop to earn 



115 

a Kvelihood for the family ; then anointed with the Holy . Spirit and Power, 
going about doing good, and performing works " which none other man did," 
and that, finally, he was abandoned of the power of God, and cniGified through 
weakness, even the weakness of frail human nature ? "Would the uninformed 
and the superficial reader of Paul's allusion to the last Adam learn from it that 
not only the first Adam, but the la,st Adam also, was a natural body for thirty- 
three-and-a-half years, and that he only became a life-giving spirit, by the 
power of God, in his resurrection ? By no means. All these facts, so familiar 
to us, are elliptically compressed into the words " was made." A process with 
so many striking features is expressed in a way which, if there were no other 
information, would conceal it. If this is the case with reference to Christ — ^if 
we are at liberty to believe against the appearance of things in 1 Cor. xv. that 
Christ was first a living soul and then a quickening spirit, why need there be a 
greater difficulty in reference to his people, whose re-awakening in the flesh 
and appearance at the judgment-seat is kept out of sight, in a phrase which 
its use in other cases admits to the possibility of covering the whole grortad ? 

Coincidently and elliptically speaking, " the dead shall be raised incorrup- 
tible, and we — the living — shall be changed.' Both events will occur at the 
advent. This is true, spealdng broadly of the subject, without reference to 
details ; but is it, therefore, untrue that both classes will " appear before the 
judgment-seat of Christ, to receive in body according to what they have done, 
whether good or bad.^" — (2 Cor. v. 10.) Does a general statement of truth 
exclude the involved particulars? Those who oppose the judgment of the 
saints, from 1 Cor. xv., argue as if it did ; as if Paul's glorious bird's-eye 
delineation of the resurrection- scene here, in its relation to the accepted, invali- 
dated the more sober details of the judicial transition process, which he else- 
where declares to be attendant on this epoch ; a process in wliich, for a time, it 
remains problematical who are to be confessed before the angels and crowned 
with life everlasting. As well might they argue that because in Gen. iii. 18, it 
is declared that all families of the earth shall be blessed in Abraham and his 
seed ; therefore, they will not suffer by judgment which will decimate millions 
when Christ, the seed of Abraham, comes to bring the promise to pass, first 
"treading the winepress of the wrath of God," as declared in E,ev. xix. ; that 
because inZech. ix. 19, it is said he will speak /?e<a!ce to the heathen, therefore, 
he will not, in the first instance, speak to them in anger (Psalm ii. 5), and 
"strike through kings in the day of his wrath" (Psalm ex. 5) ; that because 
Jesus said to his disciples "I go my way to him that sent me," therefore, he 
was not first to die, be buried and rise again ; that because he said again unto 
them, " I will come and receive you to myseK," therefore, lie would not on his 
return find the discix^les in their graves, raise them, and take account of them. 



116 

The course of true wisdom is, not to set one part of the "Word against another 
part, but to harmonize apparent conflict, by giving effect to all details, and 
fmding a place for these in all general forms of the same truth. This course is not 
taken by those who, on the strength of the chapter discussed, would deny that 
the dead come forth to judgment, with reference to their candidature for 
immortahty. On the contrary, they put Paul here in conflict with Paul 
elsewhere. They erect his general and elliptical declarations on the subject of 
the resurrection, as barriers to his own particular statements in other 
places, and those of Christ and his apostles generally; for assuredly, if 
the dead spring into instantaneous glory, power, and spirituality, and the 
living are transformed, in their several localities, without reference to the 
award of the judge, there can be no judging of the quick and dead at his 
appearing and his kingdom (2 Tun. iv. 1) ; no standing before the judgment- 
seat of Christ, to receive in body according to deeds done, whether good or bad 
(2 Cor. V. 10) ; no giving account to him that is ready to judge the quick 
and the dead (1 Peter iv. 5) ; no bringing to light the hidden things of dark- 
ness (1 Cor. iv. 5) ; no scope for "boldness ia the day of judgment " (1 John 
iv. 17) ; or place for shame before him at his coming (1 John ii. 28.) 

In opposition to this course, we have endeavoured to find, in 1 Cor. xv. a place 
for all these features ; a place unseen by the unacquainted reader, but 
detectable by those having Paul's general teaching in view. Paul is in 
harmony with himself. The resurrection includes all that is divinely associated 
with it. The upshot is incorruption, glory, power, and spirituality of nature, 
but these are only reached through the tribunal which wiU " make manifest 
the counsels of the heart.'' Prior to tliis, the future is a sealed book, except in 
so far as it is reflected in a man's conscience. The judgment wall settle all, 
separating the chaff from the wheat, and determining who are the saints, in 
deed and in truth, and who the unprofitable servants, who have had but a name 
to live, and are dead. 

We commend to the serious consideration of every one interested, the soberiag 
fact that there is a day appointed when God shall judge the secrets of men 
by Christ Jesus, justifying the righteous and condemning the wicked. It is a 
fact that will sustain every person who, having been enlightened and joined to 
the brotherhood of Christ, is working with a single eye, as seeing him who is 
invisible ; and it is a fact that, vividly realized, will correct and purify those 
who, in a similar position, may be suffering them_selves to be diverted from the 
path of truth and duty by considerations of a temporal nature. The record 
exhibited at the judgment-seat is written now in the lives of those who will 
appear there. The one will be an exact reflex of the other. A faithful 
stewardship sustained now, will be honoured then with praise, recognition, 



117 

and promotion ; while an opposite course, will bring exposure, shame, 
condemnation, and death. *' The wise shall inherit glory, but shame shall be 
the promotion of fools," 



LECTURE Vo 



BIBLE TEACHING CONCERNING GOB, ANGEL8, JESUS CJERISTy 
AND THE CRUCIFIXION; '' ORTSOEOX'' VIEWS SHOWN TO 
BE UNSCRIITURAL, 

No one professing a regard for revelation will, for a moment, question the 
importance of the subjects proposed for consideration in the present lecture. 
The "knowledge of G-od" is a prominent feature of Christian character. 
Those " who know not God" are among those whom vengeance is to overtake 
(1 Thess. i. 4). Knowledge of God is the basis of sonship to God. It is the 
very beginning of that relation, and continues throughout its primary 
characteristic. Without it, none can enter the divine family ; for how can we 
love and serve a being whom we do not know ? Knowledge is the foundation 
of aU. It is the pedestal upon which all the Christian graces are erected ; the rock 
upon which everlasting life itself is built '*' This is life eternal, that they might 
hviow Thee, the ONiiY tetje God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent" (John 
xvii, 3). Where shall we find this knowledge ? The answer is, in the 
Scriptures, in which God has been pleased to make Himself known. We 
caimot get it anywhere else. Nature tells us something. The consxunmate 
wisdom of all her arrangements— the ineffable skill displayed in her handiwork 
— ^the unmistakable evidence of design abounding on every hand — all tell us 
that God IS ; but they go no farther than this. They tell us nothing of the 
nature of His being— nothing concerning the mode of His existence, the place 
of His abode, His character. His purposes, or His requirements of us. Nature 
is silent on these things ; and where men have tried to penetrate the mystery 
without the aid of revelation, they have gone to speculative excess, and 
constructed systems of divinity which only reflect their own confused 
imaginations. We have an illustration of this in the philosophies of the 
ancients, and the heathen creeds of the present day. We cannot be too grateful 
to the unsearchable Almighty that, in His own spontaneous goodness, He 



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has condescended to make a disclosure of Himself, and has thus brought within 
our reach a knowledge more precious than rubies, even the knowledge which 
is unto life eternal. 

But this knowledge has been covered up by the Apostacy along with almost 
every other item of divine truth, and it has been covered up in the most 
dangerous way — in a way in which it is least likely to be found again by 
seekers after it. The Apostacy does not professedly deny the God revealed in 
the Bible. On the contrary, it makes an ostentatious profession of belief in 
Him. It holds up the Bible in its hand and declares it to be the source of its 
faith — that the God of Israel is its God. In this way, the impression is made 
universally that the God of orthodoxy is the God of the Bible, so that in reading 
the Bible people do not read critically on the subject, but necessarily and as a 
matter of course, recognise the Trinitarian God of orthodoxy in the phrases by 
which the Bible designates the God of Israel. If the case were otherwise — ^if 
orthodoxy in words denied the God of the Jews, and asserted its own conceptions 
in opposition to Hebrew revelation, there would be a greater likehhood that 
people would come to a knowledge of what God has truly revealed concerning 
Himself, because they would be prepared to sit down clear-headedly, 
discriminatingly, and independently, to ascertain what the Deity of Hebrew 
revelation was. But as it is, people are misled, and find the greatest difficulty 
in rousing themselves to an apprehension of the difference between the orthodox 
God and the Bible Deity, and the importance of discerning it. 

Orthodoxy says that God is three eternal elements, all equally increate and 
self-sustaining, and all equally powerful, each equally personal and distract from 
the other, and yet aU forming a complete personal unity. There is, say they, 
" God the Father, God the Son^ and God the Holy Ghost," each very God, each 
without a beginning, each omnipotent and separate from the other, and yet all 
ONE, though why one of the " triune " elements should be called the Father, not 
having begotten either of the others ; and why another should be called the Son, 
not having been begotten of the Father, but co-eternal with Him ; and why the 
third should be called the Holy Ghost, since both "God the Father" and "God 
the Son" are holy and universal, orthodoxy affords no explanation. It contents 
itself with saying that the truth is so — that there are three in one and one in 
three ; but how such a thing can be, it cannot say, as it is a great mystery. 
This may do for bigots and children, but it will never do for the intelligence 
which God has made capable of reflecting the wisdom of His mind and works. 
It is a mere juggle of words, a delusion, a blind, a bewilderment and confusion 
to the mind, and aU the more dangerous, because the theory for which it is an 
apology, emi^loys the language of the Bible, which talks to us about the Father, 
the Son, and the Holy Spirit. 



119 

The Bible representations of the ^'Father, Son, and Holy Spirit," we shall 
find to be in accord with a rational conception of things, enlightening the 
understanding as well as satisfying the heart — agreeing with experience, as 
well as revealing something beyond actual observation. 

To begin with, "The God and Father" made known to Israel by angels, the 
prophets, and Jesus, is declared to be " ONE." This is one of the most 
conspicuous features of what is revealed on the subject. We submit a few 
illustrations of the testimony : — Moses to Israel — (Deut. vi. 4) : 

Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is ONE Lord, 

Jesus to one of the Scribes — (Mark xii. 29) : 

Jesus said, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God 
is ONE Lord. 

Paul to the Corinthian Believers — (1 Cor. viii. 6) : 

To us, there is but ONE GOD, the Father, of whom are all things., and ive in Him, 

Paul to the Ephesians — (Eph. iv. 6) : 

There is ONE GOD and Father of ALL, who is ABOVE ALL, and through all, and 
in you all. 

Paul to Timothy— (1 Tim. li. 5) : 

There is ONE GOD, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ 
Jesus. 

With these statements agree the Almighty's declarations of himself, of 
which the following are examples : 

" I am God, and theee is none else . . and there is none like me, declaring 
the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not 
yet done.-Is. xlvi. 9, 10." 

" I am the Lord, and there is none else : theke is no God besides Me." — Is. xlv. 5. 

"Thus saith the Lord, the King of Israel, and His Redeemer, the Lord of Hosts: 
I am the first and I am the last, and besides Me there is No God. . . . Is 
there a God besides Me ? Yea, there is no God, I know not any." — Is. xliv. 6, 8. 

There is only one statement in the New Testament that amounts to a plain 
inculcation of the Trinitarian view; and that statement is unanimously 
pronounced by Bible critics to be a spurious interpolation upon the original text. 
It is in the 7th verse of the 5th chapter of 1st John : — " For there are three 
that bear record [in heaven ; the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost, and 
these three are one : and there are three that bear record on earth ;] the spirit, 
and the water, and the blood ; and these three agree in one." The interpolation 
is enclosed in brackets. The verse reads intelligibly without the interpolation, 
and affirms a fact patent to the early believers. The interpolation bears its 



120 

own condemnation on its face ; for it would confine tlie presence of " Father, _ 
Son, and Holy Spirit" — that is, God in every form according to Trinitarianism — flj 
to heaven, and thus upset the Scriptural and obvious fact that the Spirit is 
everywhere, and that God's presence, by it, fills the universe. A remark made 
upon it in a note quoted by the Diaglott from the Improved Version, deserves 
attention : — " Tliis text is not contained in any Greek MS. which was written 
earher than the fifth century. It is not cited by any of the Greek ecclesiastical 
writers, nor by any of the early Latin fathers, even when the subjects upon 
which they treat would naturally have led them to appeal to its authority. It 
is, therefore, evidently spurious, and was first cited, though not as it now reads, 
by VirgiHus Tapsensis, a Latin writer of no credit, in the latter end of the fifth 
century ; but by whom forged is of no great moment, as its design must be 
obvious to aU." 

The revelation of the Deity's unity, set forth in the testimonies quoted, agrees 
with the one great induction of modern science. Natiu-e is seen to be under 
one law and one control throughout its inameasurable fields. There is no jar, 
no conflict ; the power that constitutes, sustains, and regulates all is seen to be 
ONE. Cold freezes and heat dissolves in all countries aHke. The light that 
discloses the face of the earth, irradiates the moon and illuminates the distant 
planets. The power that draws the moon in circular journey round the earth, 
impels the earth around the sun, and drags even that stupendous and glorious 
body, with all its attendant planets, in a vast cycle, with the rest of starry 
creation, around an Unknown Centee. 

Is tliis Unknown Centre THE SOUECE of all this power ? There is a 
source — there must be a source — and this Source must be a centre, becaiise aU 
power is manifested at centres. The earth draws every object on it to its centre, 
and pulls the moon round it as welL The earth in its turn is attracted towards 
the sun and drawn round it ; and the sun itself with the whole framework of 
cieation is drawn round A CENTRE. 

The testimonies quoted say that all things are our of the Father, even the 
Son and Spiiit, for he is the Father of the one and the Giver of the other. 
But where is THE FATHER ? Does His name not imply that He is THE 
SOURCE ? And, being the Source, is He not the Centre of creation ? Some 
shrink from the suggestion that Deity has a located existence. Why should 
they ? It is true the Scriptures teach His omnipresence ; but that only involves 
the universality of His spirit, by and through which (out-flowing from Himself) 
His personal nature is en rapport with all creation. This we shall come to 
consider more closely by-and-by. The Scriptures distinctly countenance, and 
indeed, expressly teach the located existence of Deity. We submit the e^ddence : 
Paul says in 1 Tim. vi 16, " God dwells in light which no man can approach 



121 

unto^ Does not this amount to a localization of the person of the Creator f 
If God were on earth, in the sense in which he dwells in lighit 
TJNAPPEOACHABLE, what would be the meaning of Paul's words ? If God 
dwells in xjnappeoachable light, it is clear he has an existence which is not 
manifested in this mundane sphere. This is borne out by Solomon's words: 
God ^5^7^HBAYEN, and thou upon earth" (Ecclesiastes v. 2) ; " therefore let thy 
words be few." Jesus inculcates the same view in the prayer which he taught 
his disciples, " Our Father who art in heaven"." So does David, in Psalm cii. 
19, 20: "He (the Lord) hath looked down from the -RmG-RT of His sanGtua?y; from 
HEAVEN did the Lord behold the earth, to hear the groaning of the prisoner," 
&c. And again, in cxv. 16 : " The heaven, even the heavens are the Lord's ; 
but the earth hath He given to the children of men." Solomon, in the prayer 
by which he dedicated the temple to God (recorded in the 8th chapter of 1st 
Kings), made frequent use of this expression: Hear Thou in heaven Thy 
dwelling place. '^ Of what explanation are these testimonies susceptible, if 
they do not mean that personal Deity — the Father, the Source of all— has local 
and personal development in a region here described as " the heaven of 
heavens?" Consider the ascension of our Lord, after his resurrection, and 
mark its tendency in the same direction. Where did he go to ? Luke says 
( chap. xxiv. 51), " He was parted from them and carried up into heaven," and 
Mark reiterates the statement : " He was received up into heaven, and sat on 
the right hand of God^' — (Mark xvi. 19). To what conclusion can we come, 
but that the Deity has a personal manifested existence in dazzling light, in the 
place called "the heavens?" What position this region may occupy in 
creation it is impossible to tell. Probably it is that great undiscovered 
astronomical centre to which allusion has already been made. 

It is common to suppose that Deity is an immaterial, universal diffusion — an 
incorporeal, subtle principle, pervading the universe — without local centre — 
"without body or parts." It will be observed that the evidence adduced goes 
contrary to this view, and teaches (however contrary the idea may be to our 
philosophical conceptions of the matter) that Deity is a being of tangible 
existence. A striking illustration of the fact is furnished in the occurrences at 
Mount Sinai. There Moses had intercourse with Deity. We wiU not say that 
the Being of the narrative was actually THE ETEENAL ONE, because 
Stephen seems to hint that it was an angelic maniiestation (Acts vii. 53), and 
because Christ declares no man hath seen God at any time — (John i. 18). Yet it 
is affirmed that to Moses it was a similitude of Jehovah — (Numb. xii. 8). It 
was certainly a manifestation of Deity ; and if so, it illustrates the reality 
of Deity ; for Deity must be higher, greater, and more real than His subordinate 
manifestations. The testimony is as follows : — 



122 

" Tnc Lord said unto Moses, Lo, I come unto thee in a thick cloud, that the 
people may hear when I speak with thee, and believe thee for ever. . . Be ready 
against the third day, for the third day the Lord will come down in the sight of all 
the people upon Mount Sinai. . . , And it came to pass on the third day in the 
morning that there were thunders and lightnings, and a thick cloud upon tlie 
Mounts and the voice of the trumpet exceeding loud, so that all the people that were 
in the camp trembled. And Moses brought forth the people out of the camp to meet 
with God, and they stood at the nether part of the Mount. And Mount Sinai was 
altogether on a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire, and the 
smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the lohole Mount quaked greatly, 
. And God spake all these words (the ten commandments, in the hearing of the 
assembled people) . . And all the people saw the thunderings and the lightnings, 
and the noise of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking ; and when the people saw 
it, they removed and stood afar o£F. And they said unto Moses, " Speak thou with us 
and we will hear ; but let not God speak with us, lest we die." . . And the people stood 
afar off, and Moses drew near unto the thick darkness where God was. And the Lord 
said unto Moses, Ye have seen that I have talked with you from heaven," &c.— Ex. 
xix. 9, 11, 16-18 ; xx. 1, 18-22. 

Further on this subject, we have the following in Ex. xxiv, 1, 2, 9-12, 15-18: 

" And he (Jehovah) said unto Moses, come up unto the Lord, thou and Aaron, and 
Nadab, and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel, and worship ye afar off, a7id Mosea 
alone shall come near the Lord ; but they shall not come nigh, neither shall the people 
go up with him. . . Then went up Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and 
seventy of the elders of Israel, and tbey saw the God of Israel. And there was 
under His feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone, and as it were the body of 
heaven in its clearness ; and upon the nobles of the children of Israel He laid not His 
hand; and also they saw God, and did eat and drink. And the Lord said unto Moses, 
Come up to me into the Mount, and be there, and I will give thee tables of stone, and 
a law, and commandments which I have written, that thou mayest teach them. . . 
And Moses went up into the Mount, and a cloud covered the Mount, and the glory 
of the Lord abode upon Mount Sinai, and the cloud covered it six days. And the 
seventh day he called unto Moses out of the midst of the cloud ; arid the sight of the 
glory of the Lord was like devouring fire on the top of the Mount in the eyes of the 
children of Israel, And Moses went into the midst of the cloud, and gat him up into 
the Mount ; and Moses was in the Mount forty days and forty nights." 

All subsequent reference to these things, is in accord -with the idea that they 
related to a real person and presence. Thus we read in lumbers xii. 8 : 

"With Moses will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark 
speeches and the SIMILITUDE of tlie Lord shall he hehold.*' 

Again (Exodus xxxiii. 11) : 

"And the Lord spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend." 

Again (Deut. xxxiv. 10) : 

" And there arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord 
knew face toface.^^ 

These phases of Deity's revelation to Israel suggest the powers we dimly see 
in nature, as appertaining in their highest form to His essence and person. 



123 

True, wliat was seen was but a manifestation through angelic mediumsliip ; 
yet it helps the mind to climb to some conception (though necessarily superficial 
and inadequate) of Him " who maketh His angels spirits, and His ministers a 
flaming fire" — (Psahn civ. 4) — who is "light, and in whom is no darkness at 
aU" — (1 John i. 5) — who " inhabiteth eternity" — (Isaiah Ivii. 15) — who is 
a "consuming fire" — (Heb. xii. 29) — whom no man hath seen, nor (on account 
of grossness and weakness of nature) can see ; who only hath immortality, 
dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto — (1 Tim. vi. 16) — who 
is of purer eyes than to behold the iniquity of the children of men — (Hab. i. 
13) — the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, who 
f ainteth not, neither is weary, and there is no searching of His understanding — 
(Isaiah xl. 28). Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of His hand, and 
meted out heaven with a span, and comprehended the dust of the earth in a 
measure, and weighed the mountains in scales and the hiUs in a balance ? 
Who hath directed the Spirit of the Lord, or, being His counsellor, hath taught 
Him ? With whom took He counsel, and who instructed Him and taught Him 
in the path of judgment, and taught Him knowledge, and showed to Him the 
way of understanding ? . . All nations before Him are as nothing, and they 
are counted to Him less than nothing, and vanity. To whom, then, will ye Hken 
God ? or what likeness wiU ye compare unto Him ? — (Isaiah xl. 12-18 ). Who 
can, by searching, find out God ? — (Job xi. 7). Behold, God is great, and we 
know Him not ; neither can the number of His years be searched out — (Job 
xxxvi. 26;. His eyes are upon the ways of man, and He seeth aU his goings, 

AH life-manifestation is subordinate ; the abstract power is of God. Hence, 
when it is withdrawn, there is a return to nothingness on the part of the 
creature sustained by it. Thus, says David, in Psahn civ. 29, 

" Tliou takest away their breath, they die and return to their dust.^* 

And Zophar, contemplating the same results, says (Job xxxiv. 14-15) : 

" If He (God) set His heart upon man— if He gather unto Himself HIS spirit and HIS 
breath — all flesh shall perish together, and man shall turn again unto dust." 

Jn this connection, the fallacy of the orthodox immortal-soul theory must be 
strikingly apparent, as that theory recognises independent conscious being in 
the abstract life-power possessed by every human being, iu opposition to the 
teaching that the life in each is God's, from one common fountairi— that the 
organised dust-creatures are the individualities, and that the " spirit " within 
them, on departing, returns to its original condition in the great expanse of 
God-emanated power which fills the universe, leaving them to retm-n from 
whence they came. 

The testimony betore us teaches that God is the only undcrived and 



124 



■ 



self-sustaining existence in the nniverse, and that all other forms of life are 
but so many subdivisions of the stream from the great fountain head. This 
is virtually affirmed in the following statements : — 

" The King of kings, and Lord of lords, who ONLY hath immortality y dwelling in 
the light which no man can approach unto." — 1 Tim. vi. 15, 16. 

" IN HIM we live, and move, and hate our being. ' — Acts xvii. 28. 

"For out of {ex autou) Him, and through Him, and to Him abe all things." — 
Rom. xi. 86. 

"To us there is but one God, the Father, out of whom aee all things.'' — 1 Cor. 
viii. 6. 

God, as the antecedent, eternal power of the universe, has elaborated all things 
out of himself. " Spirit," irradiating from Him, has, under the fiat of His will, 
been embodied in the vast material creation which we behold, and now 
constitutes the substratum of all existence — the very essence and first cause of 
everything. Therefore aU things are "in God," because embraced in that 
mighty effluence which, radiating from the local centre of personal Deity, fills 
aU and constitutes aU ; and by this means is God omnipresent, because His 
consciousness by His spirit is placed en rapport with every point of His creation, 
as in the case of the human brain in certain sensitive states, which is conscious 
of everything within the radius of its own nervous effluence. This will explain 
the apparent confiiction between the idea of specific location of the Deity and 
His omnipresence. By His spirit, though located in the heavens, He is conscious 
of everj-thing ; and His infinite capacity of mind enables Him to deal with 
everything at the same time, contemplatively and executively. 

In the order of the Bible formula, "the Son" would next claim our 
consideration; but as a more rational sequence of idea, and one that will 
facilitate the better comprehension of the whole scheme of divine manifestation, 
we introduce the subject of "the Spirit" for investigation. This is highly 
important. The Spirit is much spoken of thi'oughout the whole course of 
Scripture. "We are introduced to it as early as the first chapter of Genesis, and 
only part from its company in the last chapter of Revelations. It is, therefore, 
of the first consequence that we comprehend it. Orthodox teaching on the 
subject will not assist us in the endeavour. We shaUfind orthodox conceptions 
of the Spirit as wide of the mark as its notions of "the Father." 

;rhe Father is "spirit" in His personal substance ("God is spirit." — Jno. iv. 24), 
and the Spirit in its diffusion has to do with the Father, for He styles it " mj/ 
spirit." (Gen. vi. 3.) Nehemiah says. Thou " testifiedst against them (our fathers) 
by Thy spieit in TJiy prophets.'" — (Nehem. ix. 30.) Yet there is a distinction 
between the Father and the Spirit as to the f onn in which they are presented to 
our apprehension. Of the former, as we have seen, it is testified that He dwells 



I 



125 



*4n heaven — in unapproachable light" and is, therefore, located, while of the 
latter, it is declared that it is everywhere alike. Take for instance, the 
testimony of David: — 

"Whither shall I go from Thy Spirit ? or whither shall I flee from Thy presence? If 
I ascend up into heaven, Thou art there ; if I make my bed in hell (or the grave, or 
unseen place), behold Thou art there; if I take the wings of the morning, and dwell 
in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right 
hand shall hold me ; if I say Surely the darkness shall cover me, even the night shall 
be light about me. Yea, the darkness hideth not from Thee; but the night shineth as 
the day. The darkness and the light are both alike to Thee." — Psalm cxxxix. 7-12. 

The spirit is also presented in the aspect of an agency wielded by central 
Father -Deity in the accomplishment of His designs. Speaking of the origin of 
the various tribes of living creatures that inhabit the earth, David says, '' TJiou 
sendest forth Thy spirit; they are created and Thourenewest the face of the 
earth." Again, " hy His spirit^ He hath garnished the heavens." — (Job xxvi. 
13.) " The spirit of God hath made me ; the hreath of the Almighty hath 
given me life." — (chap, xxxiii. 4.) " The spirit of God moved upon the face 
of the waters." — (Gen. i. 2.) In Job xxvii. 3, we read, "The spirit of God is 
in my nostrils." This takes us back to Gen. ii. 7, where we read, ^^He hreathed 
into his nostrils the beeath of life, and man became a living soul." Here 
the breath of life, or spirit of God, inhaled by the nostrils, is shown to be the 
agent of life. In this view, all living creatures are but the embodiment of one 
life-power, which irradiates from God, the source of life. This is in accordance 
with David's declaration, in Psalm xxxvi. 9 — 

" With Thee is the fountain of life." 

And hence we read such statements as the following : — 

" In ivhose hand is the soul of every living thing, and the breath of all mankind." 
— Job xii. 10. 

*' God giveth hreath unto the people upon the earth, and epirit to them that walk 
therein."— Isaiah xlii. 5. 

"JSTe giveth to all life, and breath, and all things." — Acts xvii. 25. 

How frequently throughout the history of Israel we read the words that the 
"Spirit of the Lord came upon" So-and-so, when anything wonderful was 
accomplished. All prophecy and revelation were communicated in the same 
way. " Thou testifiedst by Thy spirit in Thy prophets." — (Nehem. ix. 30.) '' I 
am fuU of power hy the spirit of the Lord'' — (Micah iii. 8.) " Holy men of 
old spake as they were moved hy the Holy Spirit J' — (2 Peter i. 21.) 

There are two facts presented in these testimonies ; first, that the Spirit is 
the universal power-principle of creation, by which life is subordinately mani- 
fested and nature upheld, having for its source the Father-Deity, from whom 



126 



1 



it flo^3 m perpetual irradiation ; and second, that it is tlie veliicle ol tlie 
J'atlier-l)eity'8 will, and the instrument of His operations, whether in the 
^ent work of creation, or in the communication of His mind by revelation. It 
is fiirther manifest that the Spirit is the medium of the Father's omnipresence, 
that by it, His mind or consciousness is placed e .. rapjjort with immensii^r, sad 
that He can thus be said to fill heaven and eartK — (Jer. xxiii. 24.) 

It will occur to erery reflecting mind that if this spirit is an actital element 
in universal creation, its presence ought to \>e detected in the course of the 
^extensive and relentless researches now and for many years going on, into the 
secrets of nature, in the laboratory of the experimental chemist. In reference 
te this reflection, we would recal attention to the discovery of a subtle, iin- 
ianalysable, incomprehensible principle, which is found to be at the basis of all 
the phenomen-a of nature, but which itself eludes the test of chemistry or the 
•deductions of philosophy. We allude to electpjcity. This is everywhere, 
■and is at the bottom of all organization, in fact, of -all substance, whether 
•organised or unorgardsed. ^attze in every form is but a combination (A 
.josser elements held together by electricity. Electricity governs tSie laws of 
Jan animal's life and a planet's motion ;^-onmipotent naader the hand of inteUi- 
rg-ence to destroy or build up. What is this ? Could a better came be devised 
than what the Scriptures have given it — spip.it ? It is one of the highest proofs 
•of the truth of Jewish revelation, that its disdostrre of the Deity in his relatioa 
tte the universe coincides with the facts brcnrg'h^ to light by the researches of 
the human intellect in the field of nature. 

• The employment of this element in accomplishing the designs of iatelligence, 
is LU-u-trated in the facts of animal ma^etism, mesmerism, biology, table 
trapping, clairvoyance, and " spiritualism." In these sciences and systems — 
^sonae of them ignorantly made the hasis of pretensions to divine prescience and 
•authority) — men make use of the divine '' ruach " which they naturally possess, 
^o accomplish results which caimot be developed apart from the action of 
will-power. Animals have the same spirit, but they lack the int^Uigenoe to 
Jmake use of it in this form. They use it all np in the mere process of existence, 
-3klen having intelligence, find this wonderful agent at their command to a 
■limited degree. One man can influence another Ijy it. Inanimate olDJects caa 
be moved. Distant facts and occurrences can, in a high state of nervous 
^susceptibility-, be perceived l^y it. Unopened letters canine read ; and number* 
4ess other prodigies accomplished, made familiar "by science and the facts of 
*** spiritualism " — a false ^and absurd ^stem, tased upon jnisnnderstood facts of 
laature. 

We are thus enabled to compreliend £he relation assigned in flie Scriptoree 
tie .thiB -viniversal, ^invisible «^eat, in -^e opesrations 6i Deity. Ji A-hmaan b^iAg, 



127 

Vho is but ilie faint image of ihe divine, can, in certain states, Tiave Ms -pawem 
of cognition extended beyond his material person by the action of spirit, it is 
not difficult to believe that the Deity's observation and presence are -as universal 
a-nd infinite as spirit itself. If a human being can move a needle, lift a table, 
-and compel another to act without the intervention of material instrumentality, 
by the simple exertion of this invisible ikiid ci? spirit guided by the wil, it is 
all the more easy to conceive of the Deity, who is infinite, doing ^anything He 
may will to do, ^nd communicating a revelation of Himself to chosen jnen im 
Tthe way recorded in the Scriptures. We can also understand how spirit thus 
iooncentrated under the Almighty's will, becomes JHoly Spirit, as distinct fronai 
spirit in its free, spontaneous form. This latter is one thing ; the same spirit 
used as the medium of .^ecific will emanating :fe?am the Divine ■Centre, is 
ianother. It is not another in essence., but in relation and aspect. In the ome^ 
we are in the domain of -fixed law .; in the other, God is in communion with 
us for words of wisdom or works of power, independently of £xed law,. It is 
;given to but few to experience this form of the spirit's manifestation. It is 
given to none in the present day. The apostles were the recipients of it in the 
day of Pentecost. Its power was real and felt. Its influx was accompanied 
with the sound of a mighty wind, that shook the material fabric ©f iihe building 
in which they were assembled. Its results were manifest. Ood's hand was 
laid upon the .apostles, and they were ^endowed with powers above natural law- 
'Their faculties were pretematurally exercised. They were enabled by i3ii© 
spirit to speak .fluently in languages they had never learnt ; not in unknown 
tongues, but words which were identified by the bystanders as the current 
languages of the time. These bystanders were Jews and proselytes from the 
various countries of the globe, assemlbled to ^eep ■fee feast of Pentecost at 
Jerusalem. When they hteard ihe apostles, they iSaid — 

"Are net all these which speak, .Galileans ? And iiow hear we, every man in otje 
OWN TONGUE wherein we were born ? Barthians, and Medes, and Elamites, and the 
dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Jndea and Cappadocia, in Pontus and Asia,Phrygia 
and Pamphylia, in Egypt, and in the parts of Libya about 'Cyrene, and strangers oi 
Rome, tkiws and Proselytes,iCreteSiand Arabians, we doiiearthemsipeakinaurion^ues 
the wonderful works of God." — Acts ii. 7-11. 

By the same power, the Apostles were instructed in things they did nrtt 
;know naturally, according to the promise of Christ. "When he, the Spirit of 
Truth, is come, ho vill guide you into all truth:, for he shall not speak of him- 
self, but whatsoev(?r he shall hear, that shall he speak, and he will show you 
things to com ^ . " — .' Jno. xvi. 1 S.) It also endowed them with miraculous powder, 
'evinced in the in. iintaneous cure of disease, the raising of the dead, and other 
wonderful work t^ 'I'he spirit was the medium, instrumentality, or power "^^y 
which the«e thjjr 'ire .done. It was ^ xeahty, .a palpably present ^.omethic^ 



128 

perrading the persons of the Apostles. Thus, " from the body of Paul were 
brought unto the sick, handkerchiefs and aprons, and the disease departed from 
them, and the evil spirits went out of them." — (Acts xix. 11-12.) The healing 
spirit-power in Paul could be conveyed in conducting media, and brought 
medically to bear on the afflicted. Thus also, the shadow of Peter crossing the 
sick was efficacious for cure. — (Acts v. 15.) The same peculiarity is apparent 
in the case of Jesus, to whom the spirit was given without measure. — (John iii. 
34.) When a certain afflicted woman in a crowd came stealthily behind him 
and touched the hem of his garment, that she might receive benefit, Jesus 
*' perceived that virtue had gone out of him.'" — (Luke viii. 46 ; Matt. xiv. 35, 36.) 
These miraculous powers were necessary to qualify the Apostles for the 
performance of the work they had to do. That work was to bear witness to 
the resurrection of Christ (Acts i. 22,) as the basis of the truth built upon that 
fact. Now, how could they have done this with any effect if their testimony 
had not been miraculously confirmed ? How could they have obtained credence 
to the naturally incredible announcement that a man publicly executed by the 
Romans had been secretly raised from the dead, unless their words had been 
confirmed by the power alleged to be on their side ? It is true the Apostles were 
witnesses, in a natural sense, of the fact that Christ was alive, and would have 
steadily maintained their testimony to the fact, even if God had not worked 
with them, but how could the work of getting many to believe their testimony 
have been accomplished ? It could not have been done. The earnest protesta- 
tion of belief en the part of the Apostles, though it might have influenced a few, 
would not have produced that wide-spread conviction which was necessary to 
the creation of the body of Christ. The effusion of the Holy Spirit did this. 
By the manifestation of supernatural powers, it bore witness to the truth of 
what the Apostles declared. It is said, " They went forth and preached every- 
where, the Lord working with them and confirming their word with signs fol- 
lowing.'' — (Mark xvi. 20.) Paul describes the case in similar terms : "The great 
salvation which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed 
unto us by them that heard him, God also bearing them witness with signs and 
w mders, and with diver's miracles, and gifts of the Holy Spirit'' — (Heb. ii. 4.) 
In this sense, the Holy Spirit is styled a witness of Christ's resurrection ; " The 
God of our fathers raised up Jesus, whom ye slew and hanged on a tree, . . 
. and we are His witnesses of these things, and so is also the Holy 
Spieit which God hath given to them that obey Him." — (Acts v. 30-32.) This 
is in accordance with what Christ had said : " When the Comforter is come, 
whom I wiU send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of Ti'uth, which 
proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me. And ye also shall hear 
witness, because ye have been mth me from the beginning." — (Jno. xv. 27.) 



129 

Tie power granted to the apostles for the confirmation of their testimony, 
■was deposited in them as heavenly treasure in an earthen vessel, and they had 
the power of imparting it to others. This is evident from an incident recorded 
in Acts viii. Philip, the evangelist, went down to Samaria, and so proclaimed 
the truth (of which miraculous attestation was produced by him), that many 
believed and were baptised ; but these did not at that time receive the gift of 
the Holy Spirit. 

"Now when the apostles which were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received 
the Word of God, they sent unto them Peter and John, who, when they were come 
down, prayed for them that they might reeeiye the Holy Spirit, \for as yet he had 
fallen upon none of them, only they vfere baptised in the name of the Lord Jesus). 
Then laid they their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.* And when 
Simon saw that through laying on of the apostles' hands the Holy Spirit was given, he 
offered them money, saying, Give me, also, this power, that, on whomsoever I lay 
hands, he may receive ihe Holy Spirit." — Acts viii. 14-19. 

This power of bestowing the Spirit was invariably exercised where the truth 
was received. In almost every case recorded, the reception of the Spirit followed 
the reception of the truth. It was, indeed, a matter of promise that this should 
be so. On the day of Pentecost, Peter said " Repent and be baptised, every 
one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of sins, and ye shall 
receive the ff if t of the Holy Spirit ; for the promise is unto you and to your 
children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall 
eaU." — (Acts ii. 38, 39.) This promise was realised in the experience of the 
churches founded in the days of the apostles. The spirit distributed to believers 
its preternatural powers in different forms and degrees. Eeferring to this, 
Paul says — 

" There are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in 
all. But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit withal. For 
to one is given by the spirit, the word of wisdom ; to another, the word of knowledge 
by the same spirit ; to another faith by the same spirit ; to another the gifts of heal- 
ing by the same spirit; to another the working of miracles; to another jDrophecy; 
to another discerning of spirits; to another divers kinds of tongues; to another, the 
interpretation of tongues. But all these worketh that one and the self-same spirit, 
dividing to every man severally as he will." — 1 Cor, xii 6-11. 

The object of this general diffusion of spiritual power in apostolic times, is 
thus stated by Paul — 

" He gave some apostles ; and some prophets ; and some evangelists ; and some 
pastors and teachers, for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for 
the edifying of the body of Christ, till ice all come in the unity of the faith, and of the 

* In the common version, "ghost " is given as the translation of pneuma; this ought in 
every case to be rendered spirit; "ghost" is an obsolete Saxon term, which needlessly 
mystifies the idea expressed by pneuma and ruach. 



^nowUdffe of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the 
fulness of Christ, that we lienceforth he no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried' 
about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness wherebjf, 
tliey lie in wait to deceive:'— E]^h. iv. 11-14. 

This ift perfectly mtelligi'ble. If the eaxly churchea, consisting of men and 
•women fresh from the abominations and immoralities of heathenism, and 
without the authoritative standard of the completed Scripture -which now 
«5ists, had been left to the mere power of apostolic tradition intellectually^ 
received, they could not have h^ld tog-ether; The winds of doctrine, blowings 
about through the activity of "men of corrupt minds,"' wouH have broken 
them from their moorings, and they would ha?ve been tossed to amd fro on the- 
l)iILows of uncertain and conflicting report and opinion, and finally stranded lit 
topeless shipwreck. This catastrophe was preventeci by the gifts of the spirits 
Properly qualified men, as to moral and intellectual parts, were made the- 
repositories of these gifts, and empowered to ^^ speak, and exhort, and rebuke- 
with all authority.'' They ^'rvTed'' the communities over which they were- 
placed, feeding th^ flock of Grod over w^hich the Holy Spirit had made themi 
©verseers, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but willingly, not for 
filthy lucre, but of a ready mind, neither as being lords over Grod's heritage, 
Ibut being ensamples to the flock. — (Acts xx. 28-; 1 Pet. v. 2;. 3.) In this way 
the eaarfy churches were built up and edified. The work of the apostles waa 
conserved, improved and carried to a consummation. The faith was completed 
and consolidated by the voice of inspiration,, speaking through the spiritualFy- 
appointed leaders of the churches. By this m>eans the results of gospel-preaching- 
in the first century, when there were no railways, telegraphs, or other means 
©f a rapid circulation ©f ideas, instead of evaporating to nothing; as otherwise 
they would have done, were secured and made permanent, both as regards that 
generation and succeeding centuries.. 

But it must be obviou* that the case stands very differently kow. There is 
BO manifestation of spirit in these days. The power of continuing the mani- 
festation doubtless died with the apostles ; not that (xod could not have 
transferred it to others, but that He selected them as the channels of its 
l)estowment in their age, and never, so far as we have any evidence, appointed 
•* successors." There are many who claim to be their successors ; but it is not 
the word but the power of a man that must be taken as the test in this matter, 
liet those who think they have the spirit produce their evidences. There is a*. 
great outcry about the Holy Spirit in popular preaching ; but nothing more. 
There are phenomena which are considered outpourings of the Holy Spirit ; 
hui they bear no resemblance to those of apostolic experience, and therefore 
must be rejected. They are explicable on. natural principles. When an excit- 



in 

mg- and highly mesmeric preacher gets a crowded audience, it is not a great 
wonder if his inflammatory exertions are successful in stimulating the suscep^ 
tible among his hearers, to a state of mind corresponding with his own. He- 
"but uses a natural means, which evokes a natural result. If any of the- 
natural conditions are awanting, the result is impaired to that extent. Th& 
"spirit," for instance, neyer descends to the same extent at an out-door m«et-. 
ing, as in a crowded chapel, especially if the day be windy. It is not dispensed 
so liberally to half -filled as to well-occupied pews. It does not come so quickly- 
at the bidding of a dull temperament and barren imagination, especially if the; 
man be of small stature — as it does at that of a lusty, excitable^ well-built ma% 
©r a nervous, wiry, emphatic man. The reason is, that all these conditions are- 
unfavourable to the play of the latent magnetism of the human sy-stem.. Were- 
it the Holy Spirit that attended these operations, it would overleap all barriers^ 
and not only so, but its result would be of a more worthy and permanent 
character than the impressions made at "revival meeting's," and rather mora 
in harmony with what the Spirit has said through its ancient media, than the 
sentiments induced at these gatherings. But the fact is, it is not the Holy 
Spirit at all. It is the mere spirit of the flesh worked up into a religioua 
excitement, through the influence of fear — an excitement which subsides as, 
rapidly as the agency of its inception is withdrawn. The result of an intelli'* 
gent apprehension of what the word of God teaches and requires, is different 
from tliis ; this has its sjeat in the judgment, and lays hold of the entire mental 
man, creating new ideas and new affections, and generally evolving a "new 
man." In this work, the spirit has no participation, except in the shape of th& 
Tvritten word. This is the product of the spirit — the ideas of the spirit reduced, 
to writiiig by the ancient men who were moved by it.. It is, therefore^ the 
instrumentality of the spirit, historically wielded : the sword of the spirit by a, 
metaphor which contemplates the spirit in prophets and apostles in ancient 
times, as the warrior. By this, men may be enlightened, purified, and saved, 
if they receive the word into good and honest hearts, and " bring forth iruit^ 
some thirty-fold, some sixty, and some a hundred." By this they may 
become "spiritually minded," which is "life and peace."— (Eom. viii. 6). The 
present days are barren days, as regards the spirit's direct operations. They 
are the days predicted in the following language : — ^ 

•' I will send a famine in the land ; not a famine of bread, nor a thirst far water, but 
of hearing the words of the Lord. And they shall wander from sea to sea, and fi-om the 
north even to the east ; they shall run to and fro to seek the word of the Lord, anix 

SHALL NOT FIND IT," — AmOS viU. 11-12. 

" Therefore, night shall be unto you, that ye shall not have a vision ; ami it shall be 
dark unto you^ that ye sh9,ll not di^vine ; and the ^un shall go doivn over the proi)het^ 



132 

and the day shall be dark over them. Then shall the seers be ashamed and the 
diviners confounded ; yea, they shall all cover their lips, for Dure is no answer qf 
GocZ. '—Micah iii. 6-7. 

The Angels. 

Jesus says, " No man hath seen God at any time ;" yet in Genesis xxxii. 30, 
Jacob says, " I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved." There 
are many other places in Scripture in which God is said to have appeared, and 
to have been seen and talked to, which is in seeming contradiction to the 
statement of Jesus, and requires explanation. The explanation intro- 
duces us to THE SUBJECT OF ANGELS : for it SO happens that the difficulty has 
been created by the improper translation of terms which have been employed 
by the spirit as the names of its angelic manifestations. Our translators, with 
imdiscriminating uniformity, have rendered all the words which God has chosen 
to designate His manifestations to man, by "Lord" and "God," thus in the 
majority of the appellations so translated, concealing the meaning, and creating 
confusion. Dr. John Thomas, of America, a writer of some authority on this 
subject, says, — 

" The names of God -which occur in the Bible are not arbitrary sounds ; and one of 
the chief imperfections of the English authorised translation, or rather version, is the 
slovenly manner in \vhich all the names by which God has been pleased to make 
Himself known to His people, have been rendered after the fashion of the Septuagint, 
by the two words, "Lord" and " God." These words do not convey the ideas of the 
spirit in its use of terms. " Lord " is of Saxon origin and signifies monarch, ruler, 
governor, something supreme or distinguished ..... 

"It fails to represent the meaning of Ail, Eloah, Elohim, Shaddai, and Yehowah; 
for all of which it is often, or rather most frequently, and almost generally used. The 
word Adon [another of the names of God employed in the originaF is properly enough 
rendered by "Lord," but not the other words, for which it should never be used. The 
common use of God in the English language is as little justifiable as that of the word 
Lord. God, in Saxon, signifies good, a meaning which cannot possibly be extracted 
from any of the names recited above ; God is indeed good, but that word is not a 
translation of any of the words before us, and when used in their stead, leaves the 
mind in the dark concerning the things which they were intended to convey." 

He then goes on to give a definition of each of the various words referred to. 
One or two may be selected, as throwing light on the subject in hand. Ail, 
signifying strength, might, or power : Eloah, having the same signification ; 
and Jehovah, literally I-shall-be, are all names appropriated to the uncreated 
Deity ; but Shaddai and Elohim are plural names otherv\dse applied. Shaddai 
signifies mighty or powerful ones, from Shahdad, to be strong or powerful ; 
while Elohim \& the plural of Eloah, and means gods or powerful ones. Now 
these plural names are very frequently employed in the record of God's 
transactions with men. And the question is, of whom are they descriptive ? 



133 

In Hebrews i. 6, Paul quotes a statement from Psalm xcvii. 7, in whioh the 
word "Elohim" occurs. In the Psahn it is rendered "Gods" — "Worship 
him, all ye Gods ; " in Hebrews, it is rendered as follows — " Let all the angels 
(rf God worship Him." Here, to Paul's mind, elohim represented angels. 

Again, in Exodus iii. we have an account of the marvellous phenomenon of 
the unconsumed burning bush, which God selected as the medium of 
communication with Moses. It is stated that Moses hid his face, and was 
afraid to look upon Goc?, who announced Himself from the bush as " the God 
of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob ; " yet in the second verse, we read that 
*'ihe angel of the Lord appeared unto him in the flame of fire out of the 
midst of the bush ; " so that the agency was angelic, though the power was of 
God. 

Again, in the instance already cited, Jacob says that he had seen God f aoe 
to face ; while from Hosea we find that it was not the Most High God that 
Jacob saw, but one of the Elohim, or angels. The prophet (Hosea xii. 4) 
referring to the incident, says " Jacob by strength had power with God ; yea, 
he had power over the angel^ and prevailed." 

These instances establish the point that the words "Lord " and " God," as 
employed in the English version, do not always signify the great Increate, but 
sometimes, in fact almost generally, those glorious beings who act and speak 
in His name and with his authority. Keeping this in view, many seeming 
difficulties, much made of by infidels, entirely disappear. 

The angels are referred to by David in these words : " Bless the Lord, ye His 
angels that excel in strength, that do His commandments, hearkening unto the 
voice of his word." — (Psalm ciii. 20.) Popular theology looks upon them as 
intangible beings, and pictorially represents them in books and on hearses, 
tombstones, &c., as baby cherubs with wings. Many believe that their ranks 
are greatly recruited, from time to time, by arrivals from earth of baby- spirits, 
who, thenceforth, become their mothers' guardians. This may be a very 
beautiful poetical fancy, and very pleasing to maternal instincts ; but as a 
matter of serious teaching, it ought for ever to be dismissed from the rational 
mind. It is simply untrue ; in fact, the whole of popular belief concerning 
the nature of angels, is characterised by the same mysticism and misconcep- 
tion which we have seen to pertain to other doctrines. The angels of the 
Bible are as real as ourselves, though of a much more exalted order of being ; 
and, instead of babyhood, are distinguished by all the maturity and dignity 
which belong to perfeet intelligence. Three of them appeared to Abraham — 
(Gen. xviii. 2-5.) : — 

" He sat in the tent door in the heat of the day, and he lifted up his eyes, and 
looked, and lo I three men stood by him, and when he saw them, he ran to meet them 



1^4 

ft?©m the tent door, and bowedhimself toward the ground, and said^my LoBd,,!*" iK)w I. 
have found favour in thy sight, pass not away, I pray thee, from thy servant. Let a 
little water, I pray you, be fetched, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the 
tree ; and I will fetch a morsel of bread, and comfort ye your hearts; and after that 
ye shall pass on." 



I 



Abraham thought they were ordmary wayfarers, and' diesired to extent 
Me hospitality towards them. Paul referring to the ciremmstances in Heb. xiii. 2^' 
says *^Be not forgetful to entertain, strangers^ for thereby some have; 
entertained angels unawares." 

'*^And the men said unto Abraham, so do as thou hast said.. And Abraham 
took butter and milfc^ and a calf which he had dressed,, and, set it before them ; andL 
he- stood by them under the- tree, and theyj did eat.'.'' 

In the next chapter, we read: — 

'*Two angels came to. Sodom at even ; an;d Lot sat iii the gate of Sod^m : and Lot: 
seeing them, rose up. to meet them, and he bowed himself with his face toward the 
ground, and he said, Behold, now, my lords, turn in, I pray you, into your servant's, 
house, and tarry all night, and wash your feet ; and ye shall rise up early and go on. 
your ways. And they said Nay, but we will abide in the street all nig:ht. And he 
pressed them greatly,, and they turned in unto hinx,, and entered into his house ; 
and he made them a feast, and did bake unleavened bread, and they did eat." 

Lot, also, like Abraham, supposed his angelic, yisitors to be ordinary men^ 
^nd was among the number of those who " entertained angels ui^wares.." Ho- 
was only brought to a knowledge of their true character when they said 

" Bring all that thou hast out of this place, for we will destroy this place, because 
the cry of them is waxen great before the face of the Lord ; and tlie Lord hath sent us 
to destroy it" 

Manoah, the father of Samson, fell into a ^jnilar mistake., — (Judges xiii. 15^) 
He pressed an angel- visitor to partake of his hospitality ; and it is added (ver^ 
16), "for Manoah kne7v "Hot that he was an angel of the Lord." These? 
narratives distinctly prove that the angels of God are like ourselves, so far as 
figure is concerned ; that they are not the ethereal beings, of popular theology 
is proved by the fact of their eating and having their feet washed. They are* 
as real and substantial as mortal men, but of a higher nature. Like the 
glorified righteous of the future age, they are immortal and incorruptible, andl 
luminous in appearance when that quality is not restrained. We read in the. 
account of Christ's resurrection (given by Matthew, chap, xxviii.. 2, 3), that, 
" the angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the; 
stone from the door, and sat upon it ; and Jiis countenance was lllie lightning^ 
and his raiment ovhite as snow ; " and Cornelius, when describing the^ 
vision of an angel which he had seen, says (Acts x. 30), "a ^ian stood before 
me in bright clothing,'' 



135 

The ang-els, in form and feature, resemble htmian Beings. Tliej eat aircJ. 
drink, and walk and talk, and deport themselves in general like ourselves ; but 
unlike us, they are incorruptible, deathless, perfect, and strong* in the might, 
■with which God has invested them for the execution of His purposes. They 
have power to traverse space ; but it does not require wing3 to do this, for the 
Liord Jesus- ascended to heaven without the aid of such aippendagea. It is- 
€Fnly necessary to possess power to counteract the influence of physical 
gravitation, and the ability to coioinand it at will. This power dwells in the 
angels and in the Lord Jesus Christ, and seems generally to be the- 
csharacteristic of spirit-bodies. In the angels we behold an exemplification: 
€i what th'O' saints- wiD be after the' resurrection; for Jesus says — 

** They that shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world and the resurrection 
from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage ; neither can they die any more; 
FOR THEY ARE EQUAL UNTO THE ANGELS, and are the- children of God, being the 
children of the resurrection."— Luke sx.35,,36. 

At present, the righteous are " a little lower tlian tile angel's-.'!^ — (Heb. ii. 7) ; 
then they will be on the same level. This is a ©onfirmation of all that was> 
advanced in the last lecture regarding the stat© of the righteous after they 
have attained to immortality in the resurrected state. It is a state in which 
they will be real, substantial, human-like in form, constituted of flesh and 
bone, yet incorruptible, glorious, powerful, never-dying, perfect in happiness^ 
\ nmcloyed in the exereise of the functions of their? exalted destiny* 

On the Natuee of Jesits Cheist. 

There are two great divisions of opinion among religious people on thiS' 
Ii Bubject. According to the first, Christ is believed to be the incarnation 
erf one of the three distinct essences, or personalities, which are supposed to- 
constitute the Godhead ; and that though clothed in human form, he was God 
in the absolute sense of being the Creator. This is the doctrine of the Trinit- 
arians. 

According to the other Christ was a man, begotten in the ©rdinary prooesa 
' of generation, and only distinguished above his fellows by a pre-eminent, 
endowment of the "virtues" of human nature, which fitted him to be an 
example to mankind. This view regards him as a teacher sent from God, and 
in some sense the Son of God ; but denies the essential divinity of his nature* 
;Thisis the belief of the Unitarians. Both views will be discovered to be 
'farther from the truth than generally supposed. 

The first we have already disposed of in the quotation of testimonies which 
(teach the indivisible unity of the Deity, as the one Father-power, out of whom 
I are all, and who is supreme above all. This unity could not exist if there 



136 

were three distinct co-equal personalities in One— a doctrine, by the way, which 
presents us with a contradiction in terms as well as in idea. 

Jesus emphasizes on the distinction between himself and the Father in the 
following statements — 

" I can otmine own self do nothing : as I hear I judge, andmy jadgraent is just, because 
I seek not mine own will, but the will of the Father who hath sent me."— John v. 80. 

Again, 

" My doctrine is not mine, but His that sent me." — John vii. 16. 

A^ain, 

" It is written in your law that the testimony of two men is true. I am one that 
bear witness of myself; and the Father that sent me (the other witness), beareth 
witness of me." — John viii. 17-18. 

Again, 

" This is life eternal : that they might know Thee, the only true God, AND Jesus Christ 
whom Thou hast sent."— John xvii. 3. 

Now the marked distinction recognised and affirmed in these statements is 
incompatible with the doctrine which regards the Son as an essential constituent 
of the one "triune" Father, and therefore precludes the idea of distinction. 
It is not here denied that there are "the Father, the Son, and the Holy 
Spirit." The objection now urged is against the relation which Trinitarianism 
teaches to exist between these three. The endeavour is to show that they are 
not three co-equal powers in one, but powers sustaining the intelligible rela- 
tionship of Creator and created. The Father is eternal and underived , the 
Son has his origin in the creative fiat of the Almighty, as Adam had; the Holy 
Spirit is the focalisation of His will-power, by means of His " free spirit," 
which fiUs heaven and earth. There is, therefore, a trinity of existences to 
contemplate, and a certain unity subsisting in the trinity, inasmuch as both 
Son and Spirit are manifestations of the one Father; but the faUacy of co- 
equal eternity and omnipotence will be apparent. 

But the Unitarian view is, if possible, still more to be reprobated. Joseph 
was not the father of Jesus. He himself repudiated his paternity, and was 
about to put away Mary, his betrothed, when an angel came to him with this 
message — 

'■'Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife. For that 
which is conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit."— Matt. i. 20. 

He was thus informed that conception had been induced by divine influence, 
and that the product of Mary's womb would have a higher than human patern- 
ity. This marvel had been previously intimated to Mary by the angel Gabriel, 
as recorded in Luke i. 35 — • 



I 



137 

r "The Holy Spirit shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall 

overshadow thee ; therefore, also, that holy thing which shall be bom of thee shall 
be called the Son of God." 

That Christ was an example in the sense of being " holy, harmless, and 
undefiled," is beyond donbt ; but it is also true that he was a great deal more. 
The speciality of his mission is so plainly stated as to leave no room for the 
Unitarian doctrine of moral example. " Behold the Lamb of G-od that talieth 
away the sin of the world,'' said John the Baptist, on seeing Jesus. — (John i. 
29.) How did he take it away ? The answer is in the words of the apostle 
Paul: "He put diS^Sbj sm hy the sacrifice of himself — (Heb. ix. 26.) Jesus 
himself had said "I lay down my life /o?* my sheep'' Paul also says to 
Timothy, in the 2nd epistle, 1st chap., 10th verse, " Jesus Christ hath abolished 
death, and hath brought life and immortality to oight through the gospel ; " a 
fact which is stated by Christ himself in this form — " God sent His Son, that 
the world through him might be saved."^(John iii. 17). Furthermore, Peter 
says " There is none other name given under heaven whereby we must be 

- saved." — (Acts iv. 12.) The salvation of the human race is thus directly 
\ connected with the first advent of our Saviour, and with what he accomplished 
' then ; not on the principle of moral stimulus supplied, but in virtue of the 
' essential result secured by the course he fulfilled. Unitarianism, as regards its 
' views of Jesus Christ, is a great and fatal heresy, which must be discarded in 
' order to obtain the great salvation of which Jesus Christ is the divinely 
'. appointed medium and accomplisher. 

If neither Trinitarianism nor Unitarianism be the truth, where shall we find 

1 it ? This is a natural question, which we shall proceed to answer by remarking 

that the simple appellation of " Son," as applied to Christ, is sufiicient to prove 

' that his existence is derived, and not eternal. The phrase, " Son of God,'* 

' distinctly implies that the one God, the eternal Father, was antecedent to the 

'^ Son, and that the Son had his origin in or " out of " the Father, to whom he 

must therefore be as subordinate as any created thing. " This day have I 

begotten thee " is the language of Scripture, clearly pointing to a commencement 

of days. This view is confirmed by the statement of Christ: — "As the Father 

hath life in himself, so hatli he given the Son to have life in himself." — (John v. 

26.) Christ, therefore, though now possessed of inherent life, has been invested 

T\dth it ; it is not in his case underived. It is only the Great Increate, the 

- Father, that can say " I am, and there was none else before me." Yet, though 
' Christ's is not an underived existence, it is more directly divine than the human. 
. A man is an embodiment of his father's mortal life-energy. Jesus was not bom 
' of the will of the flesh, but of God. He was begotten of Mary through the 
1 power of the spirit. This was the origin of his title, "the Son of God." See 



138 

^e angel's words to Mary : — " Therefm^e^ also, sliall tliat hfoly thing that ^a]^^ 
be bom of thee be called the Son of Ood." — (Luke i. 35). But, though Son of 
'Ood, he was flesh and blood. *' Forasmuch, also, as the children are partakers 
of flesh and hlood, he, also, himself likewise partook of the same. 
He took not on him the nature of angels ; but he took on him the seed af 
Abraham. Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto hia 
^ethren " — (Heb. ii. 14, 16, 17). He was made sm for us, who knew no sin. — 
(2 Cor. V. 21). As he was in character sinless, this could only apply to his 
bodily constitution, which, through JMary, was the sin-nature of Adam. As 
Paul says elsewhere (Rom. viii. 3), God sent his Son in the like'ness of sinful 
^flesh, "He was sent forth made of a woman'' (Oal. iv. 4), "of the seed of 
David, according to the flesh " — (Rom. i. 3). Jesus was " a mam, approved of 
'God by miracles and wonders and signs which God did bj him ^ after his 
thirty years' preparation) in the midst of Israel " — (Acts ii. 22). This is Peter's 
^description of him. Paul speaks of him as " the man "Christ -Jesus " — (1 Tim. ii, 
-5). He was tried and disciplined as Adam was, but succeeded where Adam 
failed. " Though he were a son, yet learned he obedience by the things tliat 
Jie suffered " — (Heb. v. -8). This precludes the idea of his being " very God.** 
JBe was the Son of God, the manifestation of God by spirit-pawer, but not 
Ood himself. " The life was manifested,'' says John, "and we have seen it, 
And bear witness, and show unto you that eternal life which mas with the 
Father and wa^ manifested unto us " — (1 John i. 2). And again, in his gospel 
inairative (chap. i. 14), he says — " The Word wus made flesh and dwelt among 
lis, full of grace and truth," from which it is evident that vChrist was a divine 
manifestation — -aji embodiment of Deity in £esh — Emanuel, *God with us. 
"<Godgave not to him the spirit by measure," says the samejapostle (chap. rii. 34). 
The spirit descended upon him in bodily shape at his baptism in the Jordan, 
^and took possession of him. Tlds was the anointing which constituted him 
Christ (or the anointed), and which gave hini the superhuman powers of which, 
he showed himseK possessed. This is clear from the words of Peter, in his 
address to the Gentiles in the house of Cornelius — (Acts x. 3.8) — '•''•God anointed 
^ Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy •SpiHt and with power ) and he went about 
•doing good, healing all that were oppressed." This statement alone is sufficient 
to disprove the popular view of Christ's essential Godhead. If he were "very 
God " in his character as Son, why was it necessary he should be " anointed " 
with spirit and power ? He did no miracles before his anoiating. He had 
310 power of himself. This is his own declaration : " I can of mine 
own self do nothing " — (John v. ^30), " The Father that dwelleth in Tne^ 
he doeth the works" — (John xiv. 10). Again, on Calvary, left to the utter 
jhelplessness of -his own humanity, lie felt the aiiguish of the hour, and cried out 



1B9 

'*'"My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me^ " — (Matt, xxvli. 46). Before 
his anointing, he was simply the "body prepared" for the divine manifestation 
that was to take pla,ce through him. The preparation of this body commenced 
with the spirit's action on Mary, and only concluded, when Jesus, being thirty 
years of age, stood approved in the perfection of a sinless and mature character^ 
After the spirit's descent Tipon 'him, he was the full manifestation of God in 
the flesh. The Father, by spirit, tabernacled in Christ among men. " God 
was in Christ," says Paul, " reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing 
their trespa.sses ^unto them." When raised from the dead and glorified, he was 
'exalted to "all power in heaven and earthy" his human nature was swallowed 
up in the divine ; the ^flesh changed to spirit. Hence, as he now exists, "la 
Mm dwelleth all the fukiess of the Godhead bodily " — (Col. ii. 9).. He is now 
lihe corporealization of life-spirit as it exists in the Deity. But this change 
from what he was "in the days of his flesh," has not obliterated a single line 
'of his human recollections. This is evident from Paul's words in reference to 
3us priestly function-: " We have not '-mi high priest who cannot he touched 
with the foeling of ow infirmities'' — (Heb. iv. 15). This can only be on the 
principle that Jesus retains a memory o^ the infirmity with wiiich he himself 
was encompassed. 

When Jesus said'" He that hath seen me hath seen the Fath^ also," he did 
.®ot conltradict the statement that "mo man hath seen God at ^ny time," but 
dimply 'expressed the truth contained in the following words of Paul: — "Christ 
is the imago cfthe inmsible God'' (CoL i. 15), "the brightness of His glory, and 
•the express image of His person" — (Heb. i. 3). Those who looked upon the 
•anointed Jesus, beheld ^a representation of the Deity accessible to human 
vision, 

Jesus, the embodiment of the Word, had no existence prior to his birth by 
Mary; and, as a man, he had to develop perfection of character by obedience, 
as a condition of fitness for the work assigned him. This we ascertain from 
Heb. Y. S, where we read—" Though he were a -son, yet learned he obedience 
iby the things which he suffered;" and, again in Heb. i, 9 — "Thou hast 
iloved righteousness, and hated iniquity ; theirefore God, even thy God, hath 
ianointed thee with the oil of gladness- above thy fellows." 

■Jesus declares things of himself which are held to sanction the idea that he 
existed as a person before his birth of Mary ; such as that he came down from 
heaven 1:0 give life to the world (John vi. 33) ; ithat he proceeded forth and 
came from the father (John viii. 42 ; xvi. 28) ; that he had power to lay down 
his life iand power to take it again (John x. 18) ; that he had glory with 
the Father before the world was, and was loved of Him before the foimdation 
• »o£ the world. — (John :k.yu, 4 24), ^fcc. It is ^evident, however, that we jnust 



140 

understand these expressions in the light shed upon them by the literal 
undoubted facts of Christ's life and mission. These literal facts are that 
Christ was bom a baby at Bethlehem, grew up to be a man, increasing in 
wisdom with years, stature, and experience ; remained the private and 
undistinguished " son of Joseph the carpenter," until the power of the 
spirit was shed upon him at his baptism, after which he did the works and 
spoke the words recorded; that he was put to death through weakness (2 Cor. 
xui. 4), being on the cross deserted of the power of the Father ; and that he 
was afterwards raised from the dead by the Father (Acts ii. 24, 32 ; iii, 15 ; 
iv. 10 ; V. 30 ; x. 40 ; xiii. 30, 37, and so on), through the agency of angels, 
who descended and rolled away the stone, and liberated the death-bound 
captive. With these Hteral facts in view, we are enabled to attach the proper 
sense to statements which, in a naked and detached form, would appear to 
teach the contrary. For instance, when Jesus said to the Pharisees that he 
came down from heaven, he did not mean that the person standing before 
them had bodily descended from the clouds, as his words would appear to 
teach, and as the Pharisees appeared to have understood ; he only meant to 
say that his origin was from heaven, he having been begotten by the spirit 
descending upon Mary, and having afterwards himself been filled with the 
heaven-descended spira at his baptism. When he said he proceeded forth 
and came from God, he did not mean that as a person he had emanated from 
the very presence of the Almighty, but that the Father had sent him in the way 
disclosed in the record of his birth and baptism. John is described as " a man 
sent from God." Ko one would think of suggesting that John existed before 
he was born and sent. There is no more necessity for suggesting such an idea ia 
the case of Jesus, when the whole facts are plain. When he said he had 
power to take up his life after it should be laid dovni, he merely expressed the 
confidence that God would raise him, for he immediately adds " This 
commandment 1 have received of jt? Father;" that is, the taking up of 
his life would result from the Father's power and authority, exercised in 
accordance with the pleclge given by the Father. Literally, Jesus did not 
take up his life ; the Father raised him (see references above) ; but because it 
was the Father's declared and guaranteed purpose, and because the Father 
spoke through Jesus (John xiv. 10), Jesus could appropriately say that he had 
power to raise up himself. For an example of this style of language, in which 
what a person has a relation to in the divine purpose, is considered as under hia 
control and referable to his power, we have only to turn to Jer. i. 10 : 

" See, T have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root ouf, 
and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to huild, and to plant." 

Literally, the prophet did none of these things but was overpQwered and 



141 

slain, aa nearly all the servants of God were ; yet the tilings he predicted 
same to pass, and this is taken as a sufficient basis for the highly- wrought 
language above quoted, which imputes the result of Jeremiah's predictions to 
Jeremiah's individuah operations. 

Christ's statement that he had glory with the Father before the world was, 
is no more literal than the others. The meaning of it, reduced to precise 
language, is that the glorification of Jesus was a purpose with the Father 
from the beginning. If any one doubts this, let him only give a moment's 
consideration to other portions of Scripture, which, in reference to other 
persons, employ a similar form of speech, but which no one thinks of 
construing in the way contended for in this case hj those who believe in the 
pre-existence of Jesus. Take, for instance, the words addressed to Jeremiah 
(ijhap. i. 5) : — " Before 1 f rmed thee in the helly^l knew thee ; and before thou 
earnest mit of the woml) I sanctified thee ; and I ordained thee a prophet unto 
the nations." Did Jeremiah exist before his conception? This would be the 
conclusion arising from these words, understood as those understand the 
statements about Christ, who beKeve in his pre -existence. As a purpose, 
Jeremiah existed ; his person was as clearly present to the divine mind as if he 
had stood before him in actual fact. This is the exj^lanation of words which 
rigidly construed, would imply Jeremiah's pre-existence. Look again at the 
words spoken of Cyrus, the Persian ruler, more than a hundred years before he 
was born (Isaiah xlv. 4) : — "For Jacob my servant's sake, and Israel, 
mine elect, I ha.ve even called thee by thy name ; / hace snrnamed tliee^ 
though thou hast not 'know:i me:'' The same remark ax')plies here: Cia-us was 
present to the divine contemplation as really as if he existed. Hence a style 
of language which would seem to assume his existence before he 
was born. On the same principle, the purpose to raise a dead man is expressed 
by ignoring his death, and assuming his continued existence. Thus Jesus 
deduces the resurrection from the fact that God styled himself the God of 
Abraham, Isaac-, and Jacob, at a time when these men were dead. The Sadducees 
saw the force of the argument, and were silenced — (Matt. xxii. 31-34). The 
principle of the argument is expressed in the words, of Paul (Rom. iv. 17) — 
" God who cjuickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which he not (but arc 

to be) AS THOUGH THEY WEEE." 

The words spoken of Jesus are of this order. When he said in prayer to the 
Father, " Thou lovedst me from the foundation of the world," ho did not teacli 
that he existed from "the foimdation of the world," but only that tho Father 
purposed him from the beginning, and regarded him with love from tli» 
beginning, and that, therefore, to the Father's mind, he was present. In tho 
wofdK of Peter, " He ^o.^ fore- ordained before the foundation of the world, and 



142 

manifested in tlie last times." (1 Peter i. 20.) Tlie same style of langaage is 
adopted with reference to Christ's people : " He hath chosen us in him hefore 
the foundation (if the ovorld'^ Literally, this would prove the existence of 
believers before ^lie world began, for properly, a- thing must exist to be the 
object of choice ; actually, it only proves divine foresight. The glory which 
Jesus had before the world was, was the glory which God purposed for him 
from the beginning. Literally, he had not the glory referred to, before the 
world was, for he did not exist to have it. But, on the principle abundantly 
evident, he had it. If anything were wanting to show that Christ's words are 
wot literal, it will be found by thinking of the nature of the glory Jesus received 
in answer to this prayer. He — the bodily Jesus — the body prepared — that 
which was evolved from the substance of Mary and made the subject of the 
anointing — was made incorruptible in substance, and had the spirit shed upon 
that substance so abundantly, that it made him more luminous than the sim 
(Acts xxvi. 13), and gave him power to bestow the spirit and control providence 
in heaven and earth. "Was Jesus possessed of this glory before he was bom ? 
"Was he a body anointed with the spirit before he was the body prepared ? Was 
he a real resurrected Jesus before Jesus of Nazareth was born in Bethlehem ? 
Yet this was the glory he had with the Father before the world was. It was 
a glory he had in the Father's purpose, but in no other sense. In the same 
way are we to understand the words, "Before Abraham wf.3, 1 am." — (Jno. viii. 
68.) This was Christ's answer to the incredulity excited by his statement, 
*' Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it and was glad." The Jews 
thought he meant to insinuate that he was contemporary with Abraham, whereas, 
he only meant to express the fact stated by Paul in the following words : " These 
all (including Abraham — see verse 8) died in faith, not having received the 
promises, hut having seen them afae off." — (Heb. xi. 13). It was this seeing 
of the promise of Christ " afar off " that made Abraham glad. It was the day 
presented in the promises that he saw, but, as they almost always did, the Jews 
mistook Jesus, and as he was prone to do, he deepened their bewilderment by 
Tiding anothei /rrn of f^pe^ch which still more obscured his meaning on the 
principle indicated in Matt. xiii. 11-15 : a fonn of speech which in one phrase 
expressed two aspects of the tnith conceiTiing himself, viz. : that he was 
1 iirposed before Abraham existed, and that the Father, of whom he was then 
tlie^ manifestation, existed before all. 

.Jesus said, " I and the Father are one." — (John x. 30.) He did not mean as 
the Trinitarians understand him to mean, that he and the Father were identi- 
cally the same person; ("the same in substance, equal in power and glory,") 
but that they were one in spirit- connection and design of operations. This is 
apparent from his prayer for his disciples : " That they may be one, eyen a^ we 



143 

are one.'^ The unity is not as to person, but as to nature and state ot .mind. 
This is the unity that exists between the Father and the Son, and the unity 
that will be ultimately established between the Father and his whole family, of 
whom Christ is the elder brother. When this unity is established, Christ will 
take a more subordinate position than he now occupies, in relation to the race 
of Adam. Paul says " When all things shall be subdued unto him, then shall 
the Son also himself he subject unto Him that put all things under him, that 
God may be all in all." — (1 Cor. xv. 28.) 

The Crucifixion. 

This was Christ's great act of obedience. It is common to represent it as an 
act on his part to appease the wrath of the Father towards sinners. Now, so 
far from this being the case, it is set forth as an expression of God's love 
towards fallen humanity. We read — 

"God so LOVED the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever 
believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life."— John iii. 16. 

Again, John, in his l«t Epistle, 4th chap., 9th and 14th verses, says — 

" In this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent His only 
begotten Son into the world, that we might live through .him, . . . and we 
have seen and do testify that the Father sent the ."^on to he the Saviour of the world.'* 

Paul expresses the same sentiment in 5th chap, of Romans, ver. 8, 

" God commendeth his love toward us, in that while we were yet dinners, Christ died 
for us." 

And again in 2 Corinthians, chap, v., verse 19, 

" God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses 
unto them.'' 

The death of Christ was a manifestation of the Almighty's compassion — a 
token of love, and not of anger. How was God's love manifested in the death 
of Christ i^ This is a question demanding the prof oundest consideration. Could 
not divine love have been manifested without so cruel an event ? Evidently 
not. For on the very eve of crucifixion, Christ prayed to his Father in these 
agonizing terms — ^'' If it he possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, 
not my will, but Thine be done." Now, the cup did not pass, therefore, it was 
not possible. He drank it deep, pourrug out his soul unto death. The 
thoughtful mind enquires Why was the death of Christ indispensable ? And 
what did it accomplish ? Before attempting to get an answer to this 
question, it will be well to consider the following allusions to the s]3Ccifio 
results of the crucifixion : — 

" Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures."—! Cor. xv. 3. 



144 

"^e was wounded /or our transgressions] he was bruised /o7' our iniquities; and 
with his stripes we are healed " — Isaiah liii. 5. 

" He put away sin by the sacrifice of himself." — Heb. ix. 26. 

" Christ, our passover, is sacrificed for ws." — 1 Cor. v. 7. 

" God spared not His own Son, but delivered him up /or us all." — Kom. viii. 32. 

" While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." — Rom. v. 8. 

" We have redemption through his hlood, even the forgiveness of sins."— Col. i, 14. 

"Having made peace through the blood of his cross to reconcile all things." — v. 20. 

"He hath reconciled us in the body of his flesh through death." — verse 22. 

" His own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree." — 1 Peter ii. 24. 

* The Son of Man came to give his life a ransom for many."' — Mark x. 45. 

*' The man Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all." — 1 Tim. ii. 5, 6. 

" Our Saviour Jesus Christ who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all 
iniquity.'^-— TituB ii. 13, 14. 

«* Our Lord Jesus Christ who gave himself /or our sins, that he might deliver us from 
tliis present evil world."— Gal. i. 3, 4. 

" This is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many for the remission 
of siJis."— Matt. xxvi. 28. 

*• Thou wa^ slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood."— Rev. v. 9. 

These statements are uniform, and the phraseology is definite. It is 
impossible to ignore or explain away the connection affirmed to exist between 
the death of Christ and the restoration of sinful humanity to divine favour 
and life. There may not, at first, appear to be a logical connection between 
t»he two tilings ; but a consideration of all the facts of the case will dissipate 
this impression, and reveal the deepest philosophy in the whole arrangement. 
We use the term philosophy, in its true sense, believing the most absolute 
wisdom characterises everything with which the mind of Deity has to do. 
The facts which throw light on the death of Christ are simple, and when 
apprehended in their purity and simplicity, are at once understood. It is of 
the first importance that this understanding should be attained ; for it is not 
the mere fact of Christ's transfixion on the cross by the Eomans, that 
constitutes the saving and enlightening truth of the matter ; it is the 
j)rinciples involved in the tragedy that constitute the truth to be known. 
These principles have been divinely revealed. The first is, that " the wages 
of sin is death" — (Eom. vi. 23). The meaning of this, in Bible language, is 
made so plain as to be placed beyond misconception. Paul says " By one man 
sin entered into the world, and death hj sin.'' — (Bom. v. 12.) This is in 
allusion to Adam, as may be seen by reference to the following verse but one. 
To understand exactly what is expressed by it, we have only to recal the 



145 

incident to wtiicli it refers. THs Kas already been considered in Lcctvre IT., 
but requires to be remembered again. Adam disobeyed a command given to 
him, and, in consequeiice of disobedience ^ab coNDEJiEsrED to eetuen to th|1 
GEOUND FEOSi WHENCE HE CAME. Hence " sin," which, has become an obscure 
and unintelligible term, is simply disobedienee. It is, in fact, so styled by 
Paul in the very chapter in which he describes Adam's act as " sin." He 
says "By one man's disobedience many were made sinners." — (Bom. v. 19.) 
Sin thus being but the name given to an act of disobedience or tran&gression 
(agreeably with John's definition, " Siji is the trangression of the law," — 
1 John iii. 4. ), we are enabled to understand the relation of death to it. This 
death is not a *' state of the soul," or "peril of eternal damnation in the 
flames of hell; " both of which are unknown to Scripture, either in word or 
idea, being pagan corruptions of the truth. The death resulting from Adam's 
transgression is a dissolution of being in fi'.e grave. Hence Paul puts 
resurrection by Christ in antithesis to death by Adam. " For since by man 
came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead'' This being the 
nature of death, we are enabled to understand the law which makes it the 
result of sin. Sin being the transgression or disobedience of the divine law, 
the perpetrator of it is out of joint with th« law of happiness, and is 
disqualified for fulfilling the objects of being, whether as regards himself, 
ethers, or G-od. He cannot have joy of himself, he cannot yield happiness to 
others, and he cannot yield pleasure to his Creator. Misery is the result of 
such a state; and it is one of the beneficent ordinances of the 
universe — the first law of Grod — that perpetual existence shall be 
impossible under such circumstances — that death (extinction of being) shaU 
follow in the train of moral pestilence, and wipe its evil results 
from the face of creation. He will not aUow evil to become permanent. So; 
far from decreeing or countenancing an eternal hell, where sinners 
shall writhe and devils triumph to aU eternity. His law, with jealous and 
inexorable power, follows close on the heels of sin, and suppresses the very 
germ of rebelHon and misery. This is the first principle to be apprehended 
before the crucifixion can be understood. Adam, the father of the race, 
disobeying in face of the declared penalty of death, brought upon himself the 
threatened sentence ; which having descended upon him, his posterity are 
involved in the same condemnation, for the simple reason that they are but 
propagations of his own being in all its qualities and relations, and also because 
they are themselves, every one of them, sinners by actual transgression, and 
therefore, on their own account, subject to death. 

Now here is the problem to be solved : human nature being completely 'dis- 
qualified for immortality, how is it possible that it can ever attain unto it ? 



146 

The answer is, that left to itsolf , it would inevitably perish ; because it is not 
only incapable of spotless righteousness, tub if at any stage of life it were to 
become so, it cannot set aside sin committed before, and, therefore, cannot 
escape the operation of the law of sin and death. But it has pleased God, in 
His mercy and wisdom, to devise a scheme by which human salvation shall be 
achieved without the violation of any of His eternal and immutable laws, 
the conservation of which is necessary to the maintenance of His absolute 
supremacy in the universe, and the preservation of harmony and joy everlasting. 
The scheme centres in Jesus Christ, who is styled by Paul " the second Adam." 
God has provided a second Adam to undo the mischief done by the first ; since 
He dealt with the race federally in the matter of mortality, it has seemed 
agreeable to His perfect justice to deal federally with them in the matter of 
immortality; as by one man came sin, and death by sin, it has pleased Him, by 
another, to develop righteousness and life. The necessities of the case have 
been perfectly met by Jesus Christ. The first necessity was that the law, both 
Edenic and Mosaic, should be enforced. The law required the death of the 
transgressing nature, viz. human nature. Therefore it is written : 

" Forasmuch as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself took 
part of the same . . . He took not on him the nature of angels, but he took on 
Mm the seed of Abraham.'^ — Heb. ii. 14, 16. 

" God sent His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin condemned sin in 
the flesh." — Rom. viii. 3. 

Being then invested with human nature — being " made sin (nature) for us, 
who knew no sin," he was a fit representative sufferer. But it was also 
necessary that he should be holy ; because, if he had been a sinner himself, his 
sacrifice would have been of no avail, inasmuch as his own sin would have 
prevented his resurrection, necessitating the perpetual dominion of death over 
him ; and thus the preparation of the one covering, saving name, by a resurrec- 
tion from the dead, would have been frustrated. This necessity for sinlessness 
in "the Lamb of God" was constantly prefigured under the law by the 
spotlessness of the beasts offered in sacrifice. Christ as the great antitype 
fulfilled this condition ; for it is written, " He was holy, harmless, undefiled, 
separate from sinners." He could triumphantly ask his persecutors "Which 
of you convinceth me of sin ? " — If Christ had been a son of Adam, merely, he 
could not have sustained this unblemished character ; he would have been a 
sinner, and, therefore, unfit for efficacious sacrificial purposes. On the other 
hand, if he had been clothed with angelic or immaculate divine nature, he 
would have been equally disqualified, inasmuch as it was necessary that the 
sinning nature should suffer in him. The necessary conditions were secured 
by divine power begetting a son from Mary's substance. A "Lamb of God" 



147 

was thus produced guileless from his paternity, and yet inheriting the human 
sin-nature of his mother. 

For the reasons above alluded to, the blood of bulls and of goats cannot take 
away sin, inasmuch as the law would admit of no substitute, but exacted the 
very nature obnoxious to its penalty. Christ, then, " being found in fashion 
as a man," and yet being- sinless, was a perfect sacrifice ; because being the 
representative of human nature, he could meet all the claims of God' slaw upon 
that nature, and yet triumph over its operation by a resurrection from the dead. 
The Lamb being provided, the sacrifice followed, " Messiah was cut off, but 
not for himself.'^ "He was wounded /<:>r ow transgressions ; he was bruised 
for our iniquities : . . . God hath laid on him the iniquities of us all." 
God dealt with him representatively. He visited on him the sin of the race. 
Yet, being a holy one. He could not suffer him to see corruption. He raised 
him from the dead to a glorious existence, even to equality with Himself. 
This was the essential point of the scheme, as appears from 1st Corinthians 
XV. 17, 20 : "/' Christ be not o^isen youe faith is vain, ye are yet in your sins. 
But now is Christ risen from the dead ; " and being raised, he constitutes the 
"one name gwen under heaven whereby men may be saved." If Christ had 
been a personal transgressor, God could not have raised him from the dead, 
because the law of sin would have kept him in the grave, and the scheme of 
salvation would have miscarried at its most vital juncture ; and the way of 
salvation could not have been opened through him, as a dead Saviour would 
have been no ark of refuge — no life-giver to the mortal sons of men. But 
Christ, after suffering the natural penalty of disobedience in human nature, 
having been raised from the dead to live for evermore, is " the Saviour of all 
such as come to him." He has life for bestowal by his own purchase. " This 
is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life ; and thi$ life is in His 
Son. He that hath the Son hath life, and he that hath not the Son of 
God, hath not Hfe." — (1 John v. 11, 12.) Life is deposited in him for our 
acceptance, on condition of allying ourselves to him, yea, on condition of our 
entry into him, and becoming part of him ; for Paul says of those who arc in 
Christ, " We are members of his body, and of his flesh, and of his bones," and 
the aggregate of such are designated "i^Ae jBri^6', the Lamb's wife," — "His 
body, the church." 

The question may be asked. How do we get the benefit of the result achieved 
in Christ's personal experience ? Di\dne wisdom, which is foolishness with 
men, has provided a means whereby we may do so. Baptism in water is the 
ceremony by which believing men and women are united with Clirist, and 
constituted heirs of the life everlasting which he, as one of us, has purchased. 
This will be demonstrated in the last lecture. Meanwhile, we quote Paul's 



148 

words : ''As many of you as have been baptised into Christ have put on Christ" 
(Gal. iii. 27) ; and entering into Christ, we are made one with him, and become 
heir to the privileges of the position which he has established in. himself, just 
as a woman obtains a prospective title to that whieh is her husband's on her 
betrothal. In the first Adam we inherit death without the possibility of 
retrieving our misfortune, so long as we remain connected with him. In the 
second Adam we obtain a title to eternal life ; because he has been raised from 
the dead to eternal life, after having suffered on our account. Hence the words 
of the apostle Paul, "As in Adam, all die ; so in Christ shall all be made 
alive," — that is, the "all" of whom he is speaking, viz., believers of the truth, 
us may be seen by the context — (1 Cor. xv. 22, 23). By natural constitution, 
we are in Adam. God has provided a way in which we may, by belief of tlie 
gospel and baptism, pass out of Adam into Christ, and thereby obtain a title 
to the life which is only to be had in Christ, and in no other way. 

There is another aspect of the death of Christ set forth in the writings of the 
apostles, which, however, had a more practical interest for those to whom it 
was discoursed in the days of the apostles, than for us who are of the Gentiles, 
by nature " without law." It is alluded to in the following words : " But when 
the fulness of time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made 
under the laiVy to redeem them that weee uxdee the law, that we might 
receive the adopiion of sons.'" — (Gal. iv. 4, 5). The law was a divine enact- 
ment, and was therefore inexorable in its hold upon Paul and others who were 
under it. By it, they were held in death ; for its curse was upon all under it 
w]io did not continue in all things written in it. He that was guilty in one 
licirit was held guilty of all, on the principle that the infringement of a single 
clause was as much an act of disobedience as the infraction of the whole. Now, 
to keep the law absolutely inviolate, was an impossible thing for human nature. 
Peter styles it " a yoke which neither we nor our fathers were able to bear ; " 
(Act:, XV. 10,) and Paul's testimony is that "it was weak through the flesh." 
vT\om. ^iii. 3.) Human nature was too frail to maintain a uniformly rigid 
adherence to its commandments. " There is not a man that livethand sinneth 
not." Hence, life could not come by the law, as it predicated it upon conditions 
unattainable by those who were under it. "The commandment," says Paul, 
"which was ordained to life, I found to he unto death." — (Eom. vii. 10). 
And so it was : all, under the law, were under sentence of death by it, and 
were, under the circumstances, specially debarred from life, because, in addition 
to the curse of Eden, they were also under the curse of Sinai Now the sacrificial 
mission of Christ comprehended within its scope the redemption of this class, 
as stated in the passage abeady quoted ; and it was effected on something like 
the principle observed in the case of those under Adamic condemnation. Jesui 



149 

had to bear the curse of the law on their account, so that in him they might be 
delivered from its bondage. And how was this done ? How could the law 
durse Jesus, who kept the law spotless P The answer is to be found in the 
following statement, (Gal. iii. 13) : "Christ hath redeemed us from the curse 
of the law^ being made a curse for us : for it is written, cursed is every onj^ 
THAT HANGETH ON A TEEE." Christ became obnoxious to the condemnation 
of the law by the mode of his death ; and thus becoming its victim, he met, in 
his death, its fuU claims upon those whom he represented, who, on passing 
ink) him, subsequent to his resurrection, attained to his freedom from its. 
jurisdiction. Plence Paul says (Rom. vii. 4), " My brethren, ye are become 
dead to the law by the body op Christ, that ye should be married to another, 
even to him who is raised from the dead." 

Thus has Jesus, by his death and resurrection, become the Saviour of both 
Jews and Gentiles ; but on a principle totally different from that which regards 
him as the substitute for immortal souls, doomed to the eternal pains of hell. 

Woe be to those who despise this offered salvation. Many such there are in 
our " enlightened " day and generation. Proud in the possession of superior 
intellect (which they forget was not self -bestowed), and complacent in their 
own sense of self-sufficiency (which they perceive not is a delusion), they trust 
to their own moral goodness to procure them a portion in the glorious ages. 
Never was there a greater mistake, and never a greater disappointment than 
that which awaits those who thus " go about to establish their own righteous- 
ness," and refuse to submit to "the righteousness of God," (E-om. x. 3,) 
provided in Jesus Christ for the participation of aU. who " hunger and thirst 
after it " — (Matt. v. 6). Natural virtue will avail nothing for the futiire, 
because, in itself^ it is related only to the present, and establishes no right 
in respect of future existence ; and those who are trusting to it, are building 
their house upon a foundation of sand, which will give way when the trial 
comes. There is only one name given under heaven whereby men can be 
saved; and if we refuse to put on that name, and thus reject Christ, "who is 
made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctiiication, and redemption," 
(1 Corinthians i. 30,) there remaineth nothing for us but the utter worthless- 
ness of our own mortality, which will perish for ever under the just condemnation 
of him who hath already passed the decree in prospect — " Whosoever hath not, 
from him shall be taken away, even that he hath.'' 

reader, "refuse not Him that speaketh! " Turn not thine ear from tlie 
invitation which calls thee to drhik of the fountain of the water of life freely ! 
Gladly accept it ; humbly comply witJi its requirements ; and thou shalt, in 
due time, be delivered from the bondage of mortal flesh which lies heavy upon 
thgkQ, and be promoted to the glorious liberty of the childi'cn of God ! 



iriO 



LE CTURE V. (a.) 



rJT^ DBFIL NOT A FERSONAL AGENT OR STTPERKAIURAL 

FOWER OF EVIL, BUT A SCRIFTURAL FERSONIFICATION OF 

SIN IN ITS SEVERAL FORMS OF MANIFESTATION 

In most systems of theology, the devil is placed in juxtaposition with God. 
As the one is presented for worship as the source and embodiment of all good, 
so the other is held up for detestation and dread, as the instigator and 
promoter of all evil. The one is regarded in the light of the good God, and 
the other as the bad god. It is the polytheism of paganism reduced to the 
smallest dimensions compatible with its existence. Good and evil are 
considered as separate essences, and each is attributed to the control of a 
separate deity. Instead of having a god for war, a god for love, a god 
for thunder, a god for fire, a god for water, and so on, down the whole list of 
nature's phenomena, modem theology, which is little better than paganism 
shrived and christened with the name of truth, confines the ruling powers 
of the universe to two agencies, with whom respectively it leaves the contest 
of good and evil — God and the devil. Satan is looked upon as the great bad 
agent, as God is regarded as the great good agent, and the moral universe is 
the battle-field on which they measure strength in what would appear to be a 
somewhat equal encounter. 

We have looked at Bible teaching concerning God, and have found it totally 
at variance with received doctrines. It is appropriate now to consider what it 
teaches about the devil, for there is a Bible doctrine of the devil, as there is a 
Bible doctrine of God. And it certainly is not less important to know the 
truth about the one than it is to know the truth about the other. The doctrine 
of the de^dl has as intimate a bearing upon the truth of Christ as the doctrine 
of God. This will be apparent at a glance, and from two separate points of 
view. First, the orthodox point of view. From this, the devil is seen in large 
proportions. He occupies the first position in the scheme of religion. He is 
the principal fig-ure in the picture. He is the great enemy from which our 
immortal souls are supposed to stand in need of being delivered. He enters 
largely into Methodistic outpourings, whether hortatory or devotional. He is 
the great liightmare, the great object of terror, the great fowler, with net- 
snare, exerting his utmost canning and device — which are something 



151 

superhumam — to entrap souls. Cruden describes him as "a most wicked 
angel, the implacable enemy and tempter of the human race . . deadly in 
his malice, surprisingly subtle, possessing strength superior to ours, having a 
mighty number of principalities and powers under his command . . He 
roves, full of rage, like a roaring lion, seeking to tempt, to betray, to destroy 
us, and to involve us in guilt and wickedness . . In a word, he i^ an enemy 
to God and man, and uses his utmost endeavours to rob G-od of His glory and 
men of their souls." Common belief assigns something like omniscience 
to the evil being thus described ; he is regarded as universally at work, alike 
active in England and America, and all other parts of the globe at the same 
time, and exerting his seductiveness in millions of hearts at once. He is also 
believed to be, in some sense, omnipotent, achieving his behests by a power 
superior to nature, and certainly more successfully than God in the mutual 
strife for human souls ; since hell, according to tradition, receives a far larger 
proportion of the earth's inhabitants than find their way to the celestial city. 

If this be the truth about the devil, it is of the first importance to know it ; 
for how can we mentally adapt ourselves to our spiritual exigencies, if we 
ignore the very first relation we sustain in our exposure to assault and capture 
set the hands of an unseen, but potent, and untiring, malignant foe. A denial 
of this truth — if it be a truth — is a mistake of the first magnitude, and cannot 
fail to imperil the soul thus deluded, tmless indeed — ^which no one believing 
the Bible can maintain — it is a matter of indifference whether a man know 
the truth of the matter or not. We must presume every orthodox believer 
will estimate the doctrine at its inherent value, and maintain that it is of vital 
consequence for a man to believe in the peril from which Christ came to save 
him. 

From the second point of view, the doctrine appears in the same light of 
essential importance, though the picture seen is different in hue and outline. 
Assuming for the moment that there is no such being as the devil of orthodox 
belief, but that the devil is something occupying an entirely different relation 
to the universe and ourselves, from that assigned to the infernal monster of 
orthodoxy, it is equally imperative that we understand this, as it would be 
that we accepted the popular doctrine of the devil, if that is the truth. The 
€svidence of this begins with the fact, which no one acquainted with the 
teaching of the ISTew Testament will dispute, that it is necessary to understand 
and believe the truth concei'ning Christ, Lest anyone doubt this fact, 
we caU attention to some portion of the proof of it. James, speaking of 
himself and those who were Christ's, says " Of his own will begat he us by 
the word of truthr — (James i. 18.) Paul, describing the spiritual cleansing 
to which obedient believers of the truth are subject, styles it " a washing of 



152 

water hy the word.'''' — (Epliesians v. 26.) This is in harmony with Christ'sj 
words to his disciples : *' Ye are clfean throiigh the words I have spolien to you '*■ 
(John XV. 3), and agrees with the statement he made to the Jews who were 
disposed to be his disciples: "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall 
make you free'' ( John viii. 32). Now, this truth is styled "the word of th«| 
truth of the gospel" (Colossians i. 5), "by which men are saved." — (1 Cor-. 
XV. 2.) Descending from these general intimations to particulars, we find that 
the word of the truth of the gospel, designed to cleanse and save men, consists 
of "the kingdom of God and those things that concern our Lord Jesus Christ " 
(Acts xxviii. 31), elsewhere styled "the things concerning the kingdom of God 
and the name of Jesus ChrUt.'" — (Acts viii. 12.) Hence it follows, that for a 
man to believe the gospel, which is the power of God unto salvation i Rom. i. 
16), he must believe the truth concernmg Jesus Christ. In view of this, let 
the reader ponder the following testimonies : — 

"For this purpose the Sen of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works 
OF THE DEVIL."—! John iii. 8. 

"Forafimuch then as the children are partakers of fiesh and blood, he (Jesus) al«o 
himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him 
that had the power of death, that is the devil. ' — Heb. ii. 14. 

Is it possible to believe the truth concermng Christ, and be ignorant of the 
nature of the devil that he was expressly manifested to destroy with his works ? 
It is unnecessary to answer the question. It is necessary to put it for the 
purpose of shewing that the doctrine of the devil (in whatever form the truth 
of the matter may be foimd to exist) is so far from being an unimportant 
matter, that it is one of the fii'st principles of the doctrine of Christ, ignorance 
of which argues a fatal want of knowledge in relation to the first of divine 
principles. The doctrine of the devil is not an " advanced " subject, but bears 
upon the most elementary aspects of divine truth. The idea that it is otherwise 
is due to the obscurity arising from tradition and an imperfect translation of 
the Scriptures, fhe sense of the thing, alone, would indicate the importance 
of the subject ; for how can a man be in a state of enlightenment in relation 
to divine things, who is ignorant of a matter so vastly affecting the relation 
of man to God, on whichever side the truth may lie ? 

Now, we make bold at once to assert that the popular doctrine of a personal 
devil has no foundation whatever in truth, but is the hideous conception of 
the heathen mind, inherited by the moderns from the mythologies of the 
ancients, and incorporated with Christianity by those "men of corrupt minds," 
who, Paul predicted, would pervert the truth, " giving heed to seducing spirits 
and doctrines of devils." — (1 Tim. iv. 1.) In taking this position, we are not 
unaware that apparent countenance is given to the doctrine in the Scriptures. 



/ 



153 

Nay, it is because of this circumstance that we think it worth while to devote 
a few pages to the a^ack of the monster conceit, in order that conscientious 
minds, overshadowed vrith this nightmare of theology, may see that, as in 
other instances, the apparent sanction accorded by the Scriptures to,theideaof 
a personal supernatural devil, is no sanction at all, but arises from a misconstruc- 
tion under educational bias, of certain allusions to other agencies altogether. 

In the first place there are certain general principles which exclude tJie 
possibility of the devil's existence. " The wages of sin is deaths — (Rom. vit 
23.) "Sin entered into the world, and DEATH ly sui."-.-(Rom. v. 12.) This 
is an eternal principle: death and sin are inseparable. "God ONLY hath 
immortality" — (1 Timothy vi. 17); and He bestows it on the principle of 
obedience. Disobedience, which is sin. He will not tolerate ; in every case He 
visits it with death. Therefore the angels which kept not their first estate, were 
cast down to hell (the grave), and reserved under chains of darkness (the bonds 
of death) — (Jude 6 ; 2 Peter ii. 2, 4) ; therefore Adam was sentenced to return 
to the ground — (Gen. iii. 19) ; therefore Moses was prohibited from entering 
the promised land, and condemned to die (Deut. xxxii, 48, 52) ; and therefore 
Uzzah was slain for harmlessly (humanly speaking) saving the ark from a fall 
(2 Sam. vi. 6, 7) ; therefore "the man of God that came out of Judah " was 
torn by a lion for turning back, in disobedience to a divine command, to eat 
bread with another prophet, under the sincere impression that in so doing he 
was obeying the commands of the Almighty — (1 Kings xiii. 1, 25). An immor- 
tal rebel is an imvossihility. With God is the fountain of life — (Psalm xxxvi. 
9) . No one, therefore, can steal a march upon him, so as to retain life and 
power in rebellion. " In Hii: hand is the life of every living thing " — (Job xii. 
10), and He cuts away the life that would be lifted audaciously in antagonism 
to heaven ; He consigTis to death aU. disobedience and sin. Will it be suggested 
that God has made an exception in the case of the devil ? It may, by unthink- 
ing persons, but the suggestion cannot for a moment be entertained. God is 
no respector of persons, whether of men or angels. God is not double in His 
modes of action. He is one. He is the same for ever and in all places. He 
does not act one way on the earth, and on another principle in the sun or other 
parts of His dominion ; his ways are wise, uniform and unvarying. Therefore 
the operation of His law, which links death with sin, would destroy the devil, 
if he were a person : "for the devil sinneth from the beginning," and must, 
therefore, have been mortal from the beginning. In some cases, the popular 
view, so far yields to this argTiment on the subject as to admit that" the de^dl 
cannot be immortal, and must in course of time be destined to die ; but saves 
itself by suggesting that, though mortal, he may have an existence contempo- 
raneous with that of the human race, and that his career will only end with 



154 

the triumph of the Son of God on earth. But this is, if possible, more absurd 
and untenable than the ordinary view. The theory of an immortal, super- 
natural devil, who was once an angel, has an air of plausibility and consistency 
about it, when not scanned too closely ; but the idea of a mortal devil — who 
never was anything but a sinner himself — entrusted with a general jurisdiction 
over other sinners (for it is said he has the power of death and disease), for the 
purpose, not of dispensing the divine law, but of antagonising the Deity in His 
dealings with the human race — doing all he can to afflict and damn those whom 
Deity is represented as striving to save, is something extravagant beyond 
expression. If this is the Bible devil, why was it necessary that Jesus should 
die to compass his destruction ? " He took part of flesh and blood, that theough 
DEATH he might destroy him that hath the power of death, that is the demV — 
(Heb. ii. 14.) Why through death ? If the devil is a being separate from mankind, 
what had the immolation of flesh and blood on Calvary to do with the process of 
his destruction ? If he were the strong, personal, active power of evil contended 
for, it wanted strength, and not weakness, to put him down. It wanted " the 
nature of angels," and not "the seed of Abraham," to enter into a successful 
encounter with " the personal power of darkness." But Jesus, to destroy him, 
was manifested in the flesh, and submitted to death. Victory crowned his 
efforts, and the devil was destroyed : in what sense, we shall see. 

The words " devil " and " Satan " occur repeatedly in the Scriptures, and are 
used in a personal sense ; it is their use in this way, as affording sanction 
to the popular dogma, that demands our consideration. The first general fact 
that strikes the attention is the entire absence from the Scriptures of a formal 
devil theory. The word occurs often enough, but there is no afcmation of the 
doctrine popularly attached to the word. This is remarkable : for if the doctrine 
be true, why do we not find it explicitly detailed like other points of truth ? 
The doctrine of God's existence ; of His creative powers; of His relation to His 
universe, is not only implied in the appellations He appropriates to Himself, 
but formally propounded. "I am God, and there is none else." — (Isaiah 
xlvi. 9) "To Vv'-hom will ye Hken Me, or shall I be equal? saith the 
Holy One. Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these 
things." — (Isaiah xl. 25, 26.) "Thou knowest my downsitting and mine 
uprising ; Thou understandest my thought afar off. Thou compassest my path 
and my lying down, and art acquainted with aU my ways. There is not a word 
on my tongue, but lo. Lord, Thou knowest it altogether Thou hast beset me 
behind and before, and laid Thine hand upon me. Such knowledge is too 
wonderful for me ; it is high, I cannot attaiu unto it. Whither shall I go from 
Thy spirit, or whither shall I flee from Thy presence ? " — (Psalm cxxxix. 2-7.) 
These and many pther declarations affirm the verity of God's existence, attributes, 



155 

and powei , but in the case of the supp ised devil, we have no such information. 
The occurrences in the garden of Eden are supposed to furnish evidence of 
the devil's existence. This is principally due to Milton, whose Paradise Lost 
has done more to give shape and body to the tradition of a personal devil than 
all other influences put together. The narrative of the temptation, instead of 
countenancing the popular belief, destroys it. The natural serpent, ^' Trior e 
subtle than any beast of the field, which the Lord God had made " — (Gen. 
iii. 1.) — and endowed with the gift of speech (no doubt, specially conferred with 
a view to the part it had to perform in putting our first parents to the test), 
reasoned upon the prohibition which God had put upon " the tree in the midst 
of the garden," and concluding, from all he saw and heard, that death would 
not be the result of eating, he said, '^ Ye shall not surely die, for God doth 
know that in the day ye eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened, ye shall be as 
gods, knowing good and evil." — (Gen. iii. 5.) 

To say that a personal devil put this into the serpent's head is to beg the 
question. The narrative accredits the serpent as a natural agent with the 
part it took in the transaction, and the sentence afterwards passed upon the 
serpent, rests upon the same basis : "Because thou hast done this, thou art 
cursed above all cattle, and above every beast of \hs: field. Upon thy belly 
shalt thou go, and d^ist shalt thou eat all the days of thy lifeJ' — (Gen. iii. 14). 
If the serpent was a passive and irresponsible tool in the hands of Infernal 
Power, what appropriateness or justice can belong to a decree which heaps all 
the blame and visits all the consequences upon it, instead of upon the Being 
supposed to have instigated its crimes ? To suggest that the serpent was Satan 
in reptile form, is again to go beyond the record, and enter a region where one 
guess or one assertion is as good as another. If this were so, how are we to 
read the sentence v^hich condemns the serpent to eat dust all the days of its 
life ? Paul evidently recognised nothing beyond the serpent in the transaction. 
*' I fear," says he, '' lest, by any means, as the serpent heguiled Eve through 
his suMilty^' <^'<?.— (2 Cor. xi. 3). The difficulty about the serpent speaking 
is more easily surmounted than that created by the theory of Satanic possess- 
ion. If " dumb ass, speaking with man's voice, forbad the madness of a 
Balaam," — (2 Peter ii. 16,) — why not a serpent be enabled to utter its thoughts 
when it was necessary to try the faithfulness of Adam and Eve ? How otherwise 
could they be put to trial ? It would never occur to their childlike and inex- 
perienced minds to disobey. The suggestion had to come from without, and 
could only emanate from some of the living forms by which they were 
surrounded. It was impossible that the Elohim should be the agent of 
temi)tation. If it be asked why temptation was necessary at aU, it has to be 
answered that the obligation to obey is never so palpable to the consciousness, 



156 



1 



as when a temptation to the contrary is presented. Obedience that cannot 
stand the shock of temptation, is weak and ready to die. Trial strengthens 
and makes manifest. Hence, the probation through which the race is passing. 
Finding nothing in the temptation to prove the popular theory of the devil, 
where next will the orthodox believer go ? It is commonly reported that the 
devil was once a powerful archangel, and that he was driven out of heaven on 
acoount of liis pride ; after which, he applied his angelic energies to oppose 
God in aU His schemes and movements, and do as much evil as he could in the 
universe, being assisted in this by a host of angelic sympathisers, who were 
driven down to hell along with him. The prevalence of this view is chiefly 
attributable to Milton. It is supposed, however, to have a certain degree of 
countenance in the Bible. The case of the fallen angels is largely relied upon. 

"If God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and 
delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment."— 2 Pet. ii. 4. 

" And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, 
he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness, unto the judgment of the 
great day."— Jude 6. 

This is all the information we have on the subject. It is scanty and obscure, 
but, such as it is, it points in a very different direction and to a very different 
occurrence from that indicated in popular tradition. It does not tell of angels 
being expelled from heaven to engage in marauding expeditions against human 
interests and divine authority, wherever their caprice might lead them ; but of 
disobedient angels, not necessarily in heaven, being degraded from their position, 
and confined in the grave against a time of judgTaent. It speaks of them as in 
custody, " under chains of darkness," — a metaphor highly expressive of the 
bondage of death — ^in which they axe held and from which they wiU emerge, to 
be judged, at a time when the saints shall sit in judgment (1 Cor. vi. 3). The 
time and locality of their fall are matters of speculation. The probability is that 
the globe was the scene of the tragedy in pre-Adamic times, since both Peter 
and Jude categorise it with the flood and the perdition of Sodom* The dark, 
chaotic, aqueous condition of things that prevailed at the time that the spirit 
of God iUumined the scene, preliminary to the six days' work of reorganization, 
may be presumed to have been due to the catastrophe which hurled the illus- 
trious transgressors into destruction. This idea is countenanced by the words 
addressed to Adam : "Be fruitful, and multiply, and o^eplenish (fill again) the 
earth," which was only appropriate on the supposition that the earth was 
occupied before Adam's time. This was the command delivered to Noah after 
the flood, when the earth had been cleared of its population by judgment. The 
sin of the angels, so far as indicated in the statements before us, consisted in 
saving the earth without authority, and probably, against command. 



157 

Be that as it moj, it will be seen that the Scripture allusions to the fallen 

angels afford no countenance whatever to the idea that there was ''a rebellion in 

heaven," under the leadership of "Satan," resulting in the expulsion of the 

rebels, and the establishment in the universe of a great antagonism to God, 

having its centre and head-quarters in the hell of popular creed. Superficial 

believers in the Miltonic antecedents of "the Prince of Darkness," quote Rev. 

xii. 7, in proof of them : 

" And there was war in heaven. Michael and his angels f onght against the Dragon, 
and the Dragon fought and his angels, and prevailed not, neither was their place 
found any more in heaven; and the great Dragon was cast out, that old serpent called 
the Devil and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world, he was cast out into the earth, 
and his angels were cast out with him." 

A more purposeless and absurd application of Scripture could not be made. 
In the first place, the things seen by John were representative of events fut in g 
his time. This is evident from Rev. iv. 1 : " Come up hither, and I will 
shew thee things which must he hereafter ^ Hence, how absurd to quote any 
of his descriptions as applicable to an event alleged to have occitrred Ifefore the 
creation of Adam ! Secondly, what John saw were not real things, but only 
signs or symbols representing real events. This is evident from the opening 
statement of the Apocalypse : " He (Jesus) sent and signified it by his angel 
unto his servant John" — (Rev. i. 1.) ; but is more particularly apparent in the 
book itself, in which the seven churches of Asia were? represented by seven 
candlesticks, and Christ by a seven-horned lamb ; the totality of the redeemed, 
by four beasts full of eyes ; an imperial city, hj a woman, &c. This being so, 
it is inadmissible to read the above-quoted acxiount of " war in heaven " literally, 
which must be done before the popular view can be maintained. The very 
nature of the scene described, precludes the possibility of a literal construction. 
Only read the chapter and realise it, reader ! A woman clothed with the sun, 
and the moon under her feet ^ is opposed \ij s, dragon with seven heads and ten 
horns, who, with his tail, sweeps the third part of the stars from their places 
in the shy I The woman gives birth to a child, which the dragon is waiting to 
devour. The child is snatched up to heaven, whither it is apparently followed 
by the dragon, for we find the dragon engaged in a war upon Michael and his 
angels in heaven The war ends in the triumph of Michael. The dragon is 
expelled, falls to the earth, gives chase to the woman, and unable to catch her, 
ejects from his venomous jaws a flood of liquid intended to drown her, but the 
earth opens, the water sinks through, the rent, and the woman is saved. Is this 
the sort of thing that sober people can believe — receive as a literal representa- 
tion of divine transactions ? Is it not, as a literal transaction, more utterly 
puerile and extravagant than all the absurdities ever invented by religious 
quackery and imposition ? Yet this is what is relied on to support the theory of 



158 

a personal devil. The fact is, it is a magnificent Kieroglyph, with a deep political 
significance, -which subsequent history has veiified with the utmost exactness. 
Tliis is not the place to go into the matter. "We recommend the reader to 
peruse Dr. Thomas's Exposition of the Apocalj^se (Eureka^ in three vols.) for 
a logical, eloquently- written, intellect-satisfying, and heart-building explana- 
tion of this and all the mysteries of " Eevelations." It suffices, at present, to 
show that Rev. xii. affords no countenance to the idea that it is the object of 
this lecture to destroy. The class of people who refer to it in support of a 
personal devil, also quote Isaiah xiv. 12-15, and Ezek. xxviii. 11-15 ; but these 
Scriptures have even less to do with the subject than Rev. xii. In both cases, 
if the reader Tvdll read the whole chapter, he will find the personage addressed 
is an earthly potentate — in one case the King of Babylon, and in the other, 
the Prince of Tyre. 

It has to be remarked that in the divine dealings with the Jewish nation, 
there is an absence of everything giving countenance to the idea of a personal 
devil. In all God's expostulations with the Jews through His prophets, the 
appeal is to the people themselves. Their stiff-necked disposition is charged 
with all the waywardness and wickedness that prevailed. There is no recogni- 
tion of diabolical agency or occult influence. Yet, if Satanic agency were a 
fact, justice would require its recognition in proceedings intended to remedy 
its evil working. Would it be righteous to charge the responsibility of devilish 
suggestion upon poor beleagured human nature ? Devil-influence must detract 
from human accountability in the ratio of its potency. No account of the 
existence of such an influence is taken in God's extensive communings with 
His chosen nation. This is one of the strongest evidences that it is a fiction. 

If there is no devil, then, such as the arch-fiend of orthodox repute, busy 
hunting souls and scheming with irrepressible and untiring activity, to thwart 
God's beneficent designs, what are we to understand by the devil so often 
mentioned in the Bible, and spoken of in the " third personal pronoun, singu- 
lar, masculine gender?" This is the question which we shall proceed to 
endeavour to answer. First, let the original words, devil and Satan^ be clearly 
understood. Devil^ in the singular number, only occurs in the New Testament ; 
Satan is found in both Old and New. "We shall take first one and then the 
other, for the purpose of ascertaining the exact significance of these words, as 
employed in the original tongue. It is no use referring to an English diction- 
ary for the meaning, seeing that the English language was unknown at the time 
the words were written. An English dictionary only gives the meaning of current 
words as currently understood. No doubt, therefore, the dictionary would 
favour the popular view of the matter, by defining the devil to be " a fallen 
angel, the enemy of God and man," but this is of no more value than any 



I 



159 

utterance on tlie snlDJect ■wMch one miglit hear in society. The wliole question 
now under consideration is whether the received (and therefore, the dictionary) 
doctrine of the devil is true. This we can only settle by going to the original 
sources of information. One of these is necessarily found in the original words 
which are popularly understood to represent the popular belief, viz., devil 
and Satan. 

"Satan" is a Hebrew word, and transferred to tlie English Bille untrans- 
lated from the original tongue. Cruden (himself a believer in the popular 
devil) defines it as follows — " Satan, Sathan, Sathanas : this is a mere Hebrew 
word, and signifies an adveesaey, an enemy, an accusee." 

If " Satan " is " a mere Hebrew word, signifying adversary," &c., obviously 
it does not in itself im.'poTt the evil being which it represents to the common 
run of English ears. This conclusion is borne out by its uses in the Hebrew 
Bible, The first place where it occurs is Numb. xxii. 22 : — 

" And God's anger was kindled because he (Balaam) went ; and the angel of the 
Lord stood in the way for an adversary (Satan) against him." 

It next occurs in the same chapter, verse 32 : — 

" And the angel of the Lord said unto him, Wherefore hast thou smitten thine ass 
these three times ? Behold, I went out to loithstand (marg., to he an adversary — a 
Satan) thee." 

In this case, Satan was a holy angel. Understanding "Satan" to mean 
adversary in its simple and general sense, we can see how this could be ; but 
understanding it as the evil being of popular belief, it is simply incomprehen- 
sible. The following are other cases in which the word is translated 
"adversary," in the common version of the Scriptures : — 

"Let him not go down with us to battle, lest in the battle he be an adversary 
(Satan) to us." — 1 Sam. xxix. 4. 

" And David said, what have I to do with you, ye sons of Zeruiah, that ye should 
this day be adversaries CSatans) unto me ? " — 2 Sam. xix. 22. 

" But now the Lord my God hath given me rest on every side, so that there is 
neither adversary (Satan) nor evil occurrent.'' — 1 Kings v. 4. 

"And the Lord stirred up an adversary (Satan), unto Solomon, Hadadthe Edomite: 
4ie was of the king's seed in Edom." — 1 Kings xi. 14. 

"And God stirred up an adversary (Satan), Eezon, the son of Eliadah, who 
fled from his lord, Hadadezer, king of Zohah."' — Ibid, verse 23. 

"And he was an adversary [Satan] to Israel aU the days of Solomon." — Rnd. 
vetse 25. 

In these cases, the translators have discharged their functions faithfully in 
translating the word, and by this means have fenced off the notion of diaboli- 
cal interference in the matters recorded, which would certainly have sprung 
up, if the word had been ** Satan " instead of adversary. In one or two other 
caseS; however, they have not translated the word, but simply transferred it in 



160 



1 



its Hebrew form, iinaltered, to tlie EnglisL. version, thus leading to the mischief 
in the other case prevented, by mystifying the idea of the origiaal, and giving 
countenance to the popular Satanic theory, when there is none in the word m\ 
relied upon in support of it. Notably is this the case in the narrative of Job's ■ 
trials. *' Satan" here plays a conspicuous part, and of course the common 
English reader thinks of the creature variously denominated the Devil, Lucifer, 
Old Harrjr, the Old Gentleman, the Prince of Darkness, Old Mck, Old Scratch, 
Sooty, Old Homy, the Gentleman in Black, &c. He sees the monster with 
horns, hoofs and tail, blood-shot eyes and and fiery sceptre, every time he 
encounters the word '^ Satan " in the narrative ; and a vivid imagination will 
supply the clanking of chains, the hissing of fire and smoke, and the general 
accessories of Satanic dignity, according to popular conceptions. This is purely 
owing to a mistaken use of the word, borrowed from bygone days of intense 
darkness. If the reader will substitute " the adversary " for *' Satan," which 
is done marginally in recent editions of the Bible, he will read strictly accord- 
ing to the original, and escape popular devilism. But who was the adversary, , 
it may be asked, who proved such a terror to Job, against whom he exerted 
such power f AH the answer that can be made is, that there is no information 
as to who he was in particular. His title would show that he was inimical 
to the interests of Job, and probably the sons of God in general — a wicked, 
overbearing lord, whose envy and malice were only equal to the dominion he 
seems to have exercised. It is impossible to be more specific than this, in 
saying who he was. We can say who he was 7iot. He was not the homed 
and sulphurous monster of orthodoxy, for he did not come from "hell" to 
attend the assembly of the sons of God, but from " going to and fro in the 
earth." He was not the "devil" of popular superstition, who is so coy of 
spiritual influence that he flies when the Bible is presented, or the godly fall 
on their knoes, for he came boldly into the blaze of the divine presence, 
among a crowd of worshippers. He was not the arch fiend of thrice -horrible 
orthodoxy, who is represented to be ever on the alert to catch immortal souls, 
and drag them into his fiery hold; for he had his eye on Job's estate and 
effects, and ultimately got his envious malice to take effect on Job's body. 
The probability is he was a powerful magnate of that time — a professed 
fellow of the sons of God — ^but an envious and despiteful malignant, who 
looked on Job with evil eye, and sought to effect his ruin. But, you say, what 
about the calamities of tempest and disease that befel Job ? Was it in the 
power of a mortal man to control these ? The answer is, these were God's 
doings, and not the adversary's. " lliou movedst me against him to destroy 
him without cause." — (chap. ii. 3.) This is the language in which God 
describes Satan's action in the matter. It was God who inflicted the calamities 



161 

at the adversary's instigation. This is Job's view of the case : " Have pity 
upon me, ye, my friends," says he, "the haistd of God hath touched me. '^ — 
(chap. xix. 21.) And the narrator, in concluding the book, says "Then came 
there unto him all his brethren . . . and bemoaoied him and comforted 
him over all the evil that the Loed had beought upok- Him." — (chap. xLii. 2.) 
But even supposing the adversary had actually wielded the power that affected 
Job, that would no more prove him a supernatural agent, than do the miracles 
achieved by Moses prove him to have been no man. God can delegate 
miraculous power even to mortal man. 

The three other cases in which Satan is untranslated are the following : — 

" And Satan stood up against Israel, and provoked David to number Israel."— 
1 Chron. xxi. 1. 

" Set thou a wicked man over him, and let Satan stand at his right hand." — Psalm 
cix. 6. 

" And he shewed me Joshua, the high priest, standing before the angel of the Lord, 
and Satan standing at his right hand to resist him, and the Lord said unto Satan, 
the Lord rebuke thee, Satan, even the Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem/' &c. — 
Zech. iii. 1, 2 

"With regard to the first, the adversary seems to have been God ; for we 
read in 2 Sam. xxiv. 1, " The anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel, 
and he moved David against them to say^ Go, number Israel and Judah." 
The angel of God was a Satan to Balaam, as we have seen, and, in this case, 
God proved a Satan to Israel. Moved, doubtless, by the general perversity of 
the people, he impelled David to a course which resulted in calamity to the 
nation. It would sound strange, in any case, to say that God was the devil, 
but so it stands in this instance. 

In the second case, it is evident that Satan {margin^ an adversary) is 
synonymous with "wicked man" in the first half of the verse. The second part 
of the verse is the first part repeated in another form, as is so frequently the case 
in Hebrew writing, e.g.^ " He shall wash his clothes in wine, and his garments in 
the hlood of gr^jpes^ " Thou wilt not leave my soul in heU ; neither wilt thou 
suffer thine Holy One to see corruption ^ On the same principle, a wicked 
man standing over the subject of David's imprecations, was Satan standing at 
his right hand ; of course, not the orthodox Satan. 

As to the case of Joshua, the high priest, the transaction in which " Satan " 
appeared against him, was so highly symbolical (as anyone may see by reading- 
the first four chapters of Zechariah,) that we cannot suppose Satan, the 
adversary, stood for an individual, but rather as the representative of the class 
of antagonists against whom Joshua had to contend. The nature of these 
may be learnt from the following ; 



^^BBMT 162 

* *' Then stood np Joshna, the son of Jozadak, and his brethren, the priests, and 

Zerubbabel, the son of Shcaltiel, and his brethren, and builded the altar of the 
God of Israel, to offer burnt offerings thereon, as it is written in the law of Moses, the 
man of God. . . . Now when the adversaries of Judah and 

Benjamin heard that the children of the captivity builded the temple unto theLord God 
of Israel, then they came to Zerubbabel, and to the chief of the fathers, and said unto 
them, Let us build with you, &c. But Zerubbabel and Joshua, and the rest of the 
chief of the fathers of Israel said unto them. Ye have nothing do with us to build an 
house unto our God, but we ourselves together will build unto the Lord God of Israel 
as King Cyrus, the King of Persia, hath commanded us. Then the people of the land 
weakened the hands of the people of Judah, and troubled them in building, and hired, 
counsellors against them, to frustrate their purpose all the days of Cyrus, King of Persia, 
even unto the reign of Darius, King of Persia." — Ezra iii. 2, 3: iv. 1, 5. 

Tlie individual adversary seen by Zechariah, side by side with Joshua, 
represented this class-opposition to the work in which Joshua was engaged. 
Those who insist upon popular Satan having to do with the matter, have to 
prove the existence of such a being first, before the passage from Zechariah can 
help them; for "Satan" only means adversary, and in itself lends no more 
countenance to their theory than the word " liar " or enemy." 

The Hebrew word " Satan," was adopted into the Greek language; whence 
we meet with it in the New Testament, which, as the generality of readers well 
know, was written in Greek. It is here where the word is most jealously 
cherished as the synonym of the popular " angel of the pit." People think, if 
they cannot prove the existence of the devil from the Old Testament, they 
certainly can from the New, most abundantly. A critical consideration of the 
matter, however, will show that in this, they are entirely mistaken. Satan, in 
the New Testament, no more means the arch-fiend of popular superstition, than 
Satan in the Old. This will be very quickly made manifest to the unprejudiced 
mind. 

In the first place, if Satan is the popular devil, in what a curious light the 
following statement appears, addressed by Jesus, in the first century, to the 
church at Per games : — 

" I know thy works and where thou dwellest, even WHEEE SATAN'S SEAT IS, 
and thou boldest fast my name, and hast not denied my faith, even in those days 
wherein Antipas was my faithful martyr, who was slain among you WHEEE SATAN 
BWELLETH."— Rev. ii. 13. 

According to this, in the days of John, the apostle, Satan's head-quarters 
were Pergamos, in Asia Minor. The fact is, the enemies of the truth were 
notably numerous, energetic, and powerful in that part of the country, and 
indulged in relentless and successful persecution of those professing the name 
of Christ. This earned for the place the fearful distinction of being styled by 
Jesus " Satan's (the adversary's) seat," and "the dwelling place of Satan," 
(the adversary). This is intelligible : but if the popular devil is iji reality 



163 

Satan, we are invited to the somewhat amusing proposition that the devil had 
forsaken hell in those days, and pitched his tent for a while in the salubrious 
city of Pergamos, whence to despatch his busy emissaries all over the globe. It 
must have been a nice time for devils in those days, when instead of being 
confined to the sultry precincts of their native place (presumed to be somewhere 
in the bowels of the earth, doubtless in the vicinity of a lava cauldron — perhaps 
just under Vesuvius), they were at liberty to master in the genial suburbs of an 
Asiatic town, and rove in freedom with the mountain breezes over earth's 
fertile plains ! Their holidays are evidently at an end ; for we believe it is not 
within the memory of the oldest inhabitant that one has been seen. There 
have been reports that they showed themselves, now and then, about a hundred 
years ago ; but there is no evidence of a reliable kind to be procured ; and it 
is generally doubted. It is supposed they were recalled to the pit long ago, 
and are doubtless busy hatching some evil plot, which they may some clay 
bring to light, in a way that will revive the memories of Pergamos. 

We pray excuse for indulgence in a vein that can with difficulty be resisted 
in connection with this aspect of popular superstition. 

Jesus, on a certain occasion, styled Peter " Satan :" 

•' But he turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee hehind me, Satan: thou art an 
offence unto me : for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be 
of men."— Matt. xvi. 23 ; Mark viii. 33 ; Luke iv. 8. 

Understanding " Satan" to mean adversary, we can comprehend this incident. 
Peter protested against the sacrifice of Christ. He thereby took the attitude of 
an enemy, for had Jesus not died, the purpose of his manifestation would not 
have been accomplished ; the Scriptures would have been falsified, G-od dis- 
honoured, and salvation frustrated. In opposing the death of Christ, Peter was 
therefore Satan, in the BlMe sense. He was, for the moment, part of the great 
adversary — the carnal mind — as collectively exemplified in the world that 
lieth in wickedness — (1 John v. 19) the friendship of which is enmity with 
God. — (James iv. 4.) Jesus, therefore, commands him from his presence. But 
how about the popular devil ? Was Peter Satan in the orthodox sense ? He 
was, if the orthodox construction of the word is correct ; for Jesus says he was. 
But the orthodox construction is the mistaken, false, foolish, superstitious, 
apostate, and ridiculous construction, and therefore we may shake ourselves 
free of the difficulties in which it would land us, and recognise the fact that 
Peter for the moment was a Bible Satan, from which he afterwards changed 
by "conversion." — Luke xxii. 32. 

Paul says "HymenDsus and Alexander, whom I have delivered unto 
Satan, tJiat they may learn not to blaspheme. '" — (1 Tim. i. 20.) This shows 
that the New Testament Satan is not the popular Satan : for no one ever heai's 



164 

of the popular Satan being employed by Christian teachers to correct the 
blasphemous propensities of reprobates. It is presumable that Satan's influence 
would have an entirely contrary effect ; and accordingly clerical endeavours 
are generally dii-ected with a view to rid sinners of his presence. At 
Methodist prayer and revival meetings — in which orthodox religion is carried 
to its full and consistent issue — the cry is, "Put the devil out ;" and this prayer 
is uttered with especial vehemence over any hardened sinner who may be got 
hold of. It is quite clear that the Satan that Paul had dealings with, was a 
different sort of gentleman from the devil of orthodox horror. 

The process of "delivering over to Satan," according to apostolic practice, 
may be gathered from 1 Cor. v. 3-5 : — 

" For I, verily, as absent in body, but present in spirit, have judged already, aa 
though I "were present, concerning him who hath so done this deed ; in the name of our 
Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together^ and my spirit, with the power of our 
Lord Jesus Christ, to deliver such an one unto Satan, for the destruction of the flesh, 
that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus." 

The meaning of this is, simply, the expulsion of the offender from the 
community of the believers. Tliis is evident from the verse immediately 
preceding those we have quoted : " Ye are puffed up, and have not rather 
mourned that he that hath done this deed might be taken away feom 
AMONG YOU." This was the apostolic recommendation in all cases of 
recalcitrancy. 

"A man that is an heretic, after the first and second admonition, reject.'' — Tit. iii. 
10. 

^^ Withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly. . . If any 
man obey not our word by this epistle, note that man, and have no company loith him.'* 
—1 Thess. iii. 6, 14. 

" Mark them which cause divisions and offences contrary to the doctrine which ye 
have learned, and avoid them." — Rom. xvi. 17. 

"I would they were even cut q^ which trouble you." — Gal. v. 12. 

To repudiate the fellowship of any one, was to hand him over to the 
adversary, or Satan, because it was putting him back into the world, which is 
the great enemy or adversary of God. The object of this was remedial : "Have 
no company with him, that lie may he ashamed. Yet, count him not as an 
enemy, but admonish him as a brother." — (2 Thess. iii. 14-15.) In this way, 
Paul, by cutting off Hymenaeus and Alexander, hoped to bring them to their 
senses, and arrest their contumaciousness. They were in the ecclesia, and 
speaking against Paul and others, and against things they did not understand ; 
and by the bold measure of excommunication, he hoped to teach them a lesson 
they could not learn in fellowship. It was Hkely to make a man tliink, to thus 
" hand him over to Satan" (the adversary). The object of it, in the recommen- 



165 

dation to tlie Corinthians, WEs "for the destruction of the ilesh," that is, the 
extirpation of the carnal mind in their midst ; for he says, immediately after, 
" A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. Purge out, therefore, the old 
leaven, that ye may he a new lump^ as ye are unleavened . . . Put away 
from among yoitr selves that wiched j?erson." — (1 Cor. v. 6-7, 13.) !By this 
policy they might hope to preserve in ptmty the faith and practice of the spirit, 
resulting in the salvation of the ecclesia as a whole. All this is intelligible. 
But if the New Testament Satan be the popular Satan, then the whole matter 
is involved in inextricable fog. The infernal devil is made to play a part in 
the arrangements of the apostles for sending men to heaven,— a part, be it 
observed, which he is never called upon to perform now. 

" Wherefore, we would have come unto you, even I, Paul, once and again, 
dut Satan liindered nsJ' — (1 Thess. ii. 18,) Who obstructed Paul's travels? 
The enemies of the truth. On several occasions they watched the gates of tho 
city where he was, to intercept and kill him, and he only eluded them by adroit 
expedients. ^' Satan," or the adversary, was the general name for the whole of 
them; but when he comes to particulars, Paul mentions names: ^'' Alexaiideo', 
the coppersmith, did me much evil. The Lord reward him according to his 
works. Of whom be thou ware also, for he hath greatly withstood our words." 
(2 Tim. iv. 14.) " As Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also 
resist the truth, men of corrupt minds ^ reprobate concerning the faith'' — , 2 Tim, 
iii. 8.) " Their word will eat as doth a canker, of whom is Hymenceus and 
Philctus." — (2 Tim. ii. 17.) The orthodox devil took no part in the opposition 
which Paul encountered from these men. Who ever heard of Bunyan's 
" Apollyon " stopping him in the way, and defying him with the arrowy terrors 
of the pit ? Yet, if the New Testament Satan be the popular Satan, this ought 
to have been among his experiences. 

" And after the sop, Satan entered in unto him " (Judas) — (John xiii. 27). 
Judas' s adverse or Satanic intentions with regard to Jesus, developed them- 
selves immediately after Jesus handed him a morsel of bread, dipped, after 
oriental custom, in the bowl on the table. Why ? Because the handing of the 
sop to him murlied him as the on an who was to he traitor* Jesus had said 
"One of you shall betray me." The intimation excited a painful and eager 
curiosity among the disciples, who began to question whom it was that Jesus 
referred to. In answer to John's whispered enquiry who it was, Jesus said 
" He it is to whom I shall give a sop when I have dipped it. And 7i'hen he 
had dij)ped the sop, he gave it to Judas Iscariot. And after the sop, Satan 
entered into him . • . He then having received the sop, went immediately 
outy It was not surprising that Judas, thus openly identified, should, as it 
were, fling off the cloak, and allow his treachery to blaze up in his bosom in a 



166 



flaiae ot Ml and desperate intent. This was, in New Testament phrase, 
" Satan entering into him," that is, the adversary rising* within him. "Was 
this the popular Satan ? If so, why was Judas punished for the devil's sin ? 
^ It were good for that man^" said Jesus, " that he had not been born," shewing 
that the sin of Christ's betrayal was charged upon the man Judas, which 
could not have been done if his treachery was due to the power of a 
machinating infernal devil of the orthodox type, taking possession of him and 
impelling him to the act. There is another case where the sinful action of the 
human heart is described as the inspiration of "Satan." — (Acts v. 3.) 
Ananias and Sapphira went into the presence of the apostles with a lie on 
their Kps; Peter said, "Ananias, 7vhy hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to 
the Holy Spirit, and to keep back part of the price of the land?" The 
meaning of Satan filling the heart, crops out in the next sentence but one : 
"Why hast thou conceived this thing in thine heart" (verse 4) ; also in 
Peter's address to Sapphira, who came in three hours after Ananias. Peter 
said unto her " How is it that ye have ageeed together to tempt the spirit 
of the Lord ? " (verse 9.) But supposing we had not been thus informed that 
the lie of Ananias was due to a compact with his wife, from selfish motives, 
to misrepresent the extent of their property, we should have had no difficulty in 
understanding that Satan filling the heart was the spirit of the flesh, which is 
the great Satan or adversary, moving him to the particular line of action 
which evoked Peter's rebuke Tames defines the process of sin as follows: 
" Every man is tempted when he is drawn away of his own lust and enticed. 
Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth death." — (James i. 14, 15.) 
Hence, the action of lust in the mind is the action of the New Testament Satan, 
or adversary. All sin proceeds from the desires of the flesh. This is declared 
in various forms of speech in the Scriptures, and agrees with the experience of 
overy man. The following are illustrations : 

" Out of the heaut 'proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, 
thefts, false witness, (this was the sin of Ananias), blasphemies," &c.— Matt. xv. 19, 



It is not subject to the law of God, 



" The CARXAL MIND is enmity against God, 
neither indeed can be." — Rom. viii. 7. 

"Now the WORKS of the flesh are manifest, which are these : adultery, fornica- 
tion, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, 
wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, reveliings, and 
such Hke."— Gal. v. 19, 21. 

" For ALL that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, 
and the pride of life, is of the v^^orld."— 1 John ii. 16. 

The great Satan, or adversary, then, which every man has to fear, and which 
is ever inclining him to a icourse opposed to wisdom and godliness, is the 
tendency of the mere animal instincts to act on their own account. This 



187 

tendency is the spirit or incKnation of the flesh, which must be vigilantly 
repressed for a man to keep out of the way of evil. The truth alone, which is 
the utterance and power of the spirit, will enable him to do this. If he 
surrender to the flesh, he walks in the way of death. " If ye live after the flesh 
ye shall die ; but if ye, through the spirit, do mortify the deeds of the body, ye 
shall Hve." — (Rom. viii. 13.) The object of the gospel being sent to the 
Gentiles by Paul, was to turn them/r<9m darliness VMto lights and the power 
of Satan unto God.'' Ignorance, or darkness, is the great power of the 
adversary lurking within us : for where a man is ignorant of God's vdll, the 
flesh has a controlling power with him. " The Gentiles are alienated from 
God, throvgli the ignorance that is in them.'' — (Eph. iv. 18.) EnKghtenment, 
through the hearing of the Word, creates a new man within, who, in process of 
time, kills the old man "who is corrupt according to deceitful lusts " (Eph. iv. 
22), or, at least, keep him under, lest the new man become a castaway. — 
(1 Cor. ix. 27.) Introduce the active, plotting, intelligent fiend of orthodoxy, 
and the whole picture is changed and involved in bewildering confusion. But 
he cannot be introduced. Our experience forbids us believing in the existence 
of such a being : for look at the fact ; men are prone to evil in proportion to 
the relative strength of the animal nature. Some men are naturally amiable, 
intellectual, benevolent, and correct; they cannot be anything else in the 
circumstances and with the organization which are theirs. Others, again, are 
naturally coarse, rough, brutish, thick-headed, low, and selfish, through the 
power of ignorance and an inferior organization, which prevent them ever 
ascending to nobility of nature. Jesus recognizes this fact in the parable of 
the sower. The seed fell into different hinds of soil. One is styled " good 
ground." In this, the seed grew well, and brought forth much fruit. In his 
explanation of the parable, Jesus defines the good ground to be " the honest 
and good heart." — (Luke viii. 15.) This is in exact accord with experience. 
Only a certain class of mind is influenced by the word of truth. There are 
people on whom the preaching of the Word is wasted effort. Jesus terms such 
" swine," and says " Cast not your pearls before them ; give not that which is 
holy unto dogs." A much larger result attends the proclamation of the truth 
among the English, for instance, than among the Caribs of South America, or 
the Zulus of Africa. The soil is better, both as to quality and culture. Now, 
in view of this fact that good and evil, in the moral sense, are determined by 
organization and education, what place is there for the Satan of orthodox 
belief, whose influence for evil is reputed to be of a spiritual order, and whoso 
power is believed to be exerted on all, without distinction of education, 
condition, or race ? The theory is an outrage upon reason, and a caricature of 
religious truth of the most pernicious order ; for it brings upon the Bible an 



168 

amonnt of slight and disparagement for which there would otherwise be no 
ground. 

These general explanations wiU cover all the other instances in which the 
word *' Satan " is used in the New Testament. All will be found capable of 
solution by reading "Satan" as the adversary, and, having regard to the 
circumstances under which the word is used. Sometimes "Satan" will be 
found a person, sometimes the authorities, sometimes the flesh ; in fact, 
whatever acts the part of an adversary is, Scripturally, " Satan ; " but 
** Satan " is never the superhuman power of popular belief. 

We must now pass on to consider the word "devil," another word of frequent 
occurrence in the Xew Testament, and the word which is more particularly 
associated in the popular mind with the tradition of a supernatural evil being. 
The orthodox believer, giving way to the Eible doctrine of Satanism, herein 
set forth, is prone to cling to the word " devil," with the idea that here at any 
rate, his darling theory is safe ; that under the broad shelter of this world- 
renowned term of theology, the personality of the arch-rebel of the universe 
is secure from the arrows of criticism. We might summarily dispose of this 
illusion, by pointing to the fact that *" devil,'" in many instances, is used inter- 
changeably and along with ''Satan," and that, therefore, the two stand or 
fall together. Eut as this, though logical, might not be quite conclusive to 
the class of minds which these lectures are intended to reach, we shall investi- 
gate this part of the subject separately, and on its own merits. 

First, then, with regard to the word *' devil," Cruden remarks '• This word 
comes from the Greek diaholos^ which signifies a calumniator or accuser.'^ 
Parkhurst says " The original word diaholos comes from diabebola, the perfect 
tense J middle Yoice oi di aba Ilo, which is compounded of dia, through; and 
?>aZ^. to cast ; therefore, meaning to dart or strike tJiro'ugh; whence, in a 
figurative sense, it signifies to strike or stab jvith an accusation of evil report" 
Hence, Parkhurst defines diabolos as a substantive, to mean '* an accuser, a 
slanderer," which he illustrates by referring to 1 Tim. iii. 11 ; 2 Tim. ui. 3 ; 
Titus ii. 3 : in all of which, as the reader will perceive by perusing the 
passages, it is applied to human beings. From this it will be perceived that 
the word "devil," properly understood, is a general tenn, and not a proper 
name. It is a word, that is, and may be applied in any case where slander, 
accusation, or falsehood are exemplified. As Jesus applied " Satan' to Peter, 
60 he applied " devil " to Judas : " Have I not chosen you twelve, and one of 
you ii A DEVIL r" — (John vi. 70.) Judas proved a liar, a betrayer, a false 
accuser, and therefore, a devil. Paul, in 1 Tim. ui. 11, tells the wives of 
deacons not to be devils. His exhortation, it is true, does not appear in this form 
in the English version. The words, as translated, are "Even so must their wives 



I 



169 

be grave, not slanderers (didbolous)'' This is a plural inflection of tlie word 
translated devil, and ought to be rendered uniformly with its occurrence 
elsewhere. Either this ought to be " devils," or devil elsewhere ought to be 
false accuser. The same remark applies to 2 Tim. iii. 2, 3 : " For men shall be 
/ . . . without natural affection, truce -breakers, false accusers 
(diadoloij ; " and to Titus ii. 3 : "The aged woman, likewise, that they be in 
behaviour as becometh holiness, not false -accusers {dialfolo2ts)J' Jesus 
applied the term to the persecuting authorities of the Roman State. He said 
in his letter, through John, to the church at Smyrna, " The devil shall cast 
some of you into prison." — (Rev. ii. 10.) The pagan authorities were the 
accusers and hunters of the early Christians, bent upon " stabbing-through " 
and killing to the ground, the whole sect. In the same book, the power of the 
world, politically organised on the sin-basis (introduced under the symbol of 
a dragon, having seven heads and ten horns), is styled " that old serpent, 
wMcli is the devil and Satan." In these instances, the popular construction 
of the word "devil" is entirely excluded, and its meaning and use as a 
general term, are illustrated. There is, however, a wider use of it in the 
New Testament, which, while superficially countenancing the orthodox view, 
is more directly destructive of that view than even the limited cases oited. It 
4iB that which personifies the great principle which lies at the bottom of the 
ri&pture at present existing between God and man, as pre-eminently the 
accuser and striker through with a dart — the calumniator of God and the 
destroyer of mankind. First, let the fact of his personification be demonstrated. 
The evidence of it makes a powerful beginning in Heb. ii. 14, where we read 
as follows : — 

" Forasmuch, then, as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he [Jesus] 
also himself likewise took part of the same, that thrmgh death, he might destroy 
him that hath the power of death, that is, the devil." 

On the supposition that the devil here referred to is the orthodox devil, or a 
personal devil of any kind, there are four absurdities on the face of this passage. 
In the first place, to take on the weakness of flesh and blood was a strange way 
of preparing to fight a powerful devil who, it would be imagined, would be 
more successfully encountered in the panoply of angelic strength, which Paul 
expressly says Jesus did not array himself in ; for he says, " He took not on 
him the nature of angels." — (Heb. ii. 16.) In the second place, it was 
stranger stiU that the process of destroying the devil should be submission to 
death himself ! It was a curious way of killing another, to die himself ! One 
would have thought that to vanquish and destroy the devil, life inextinguisha- 
ble, and strength indomitable, would have been the qualification. Undoubtedly, 
they would have been so, if the Bible devil had been the orthodox devil — a 



170 



personal monster. In the third place, the devil ought now to be dead, or what- 
ever else is imported by the word "destroyed," for Christ died eighteen 
centuries ago, for the purpose of destroying him hy that j^f'ocess. How comes 
it, then, that the devil is clerically represented to be alive and busier than 
ever in the work of hunting immortal souls with gin and snare, and exporting 
them to his own grim domain, when fairly captured ? In the fourth place, what an 
extraordinary proposition that the popular devil has the " power of death ! ^* 
It can only be received on the supposition that the devil acts as God's police- 
man : but this will not square with the Mil tonic and popular view, that God 
and the devil are sworn enemies, the latter delighting to thwart the former to 
the utmost extent in his power. "Who made Adam mortal ? Who punishes 
the infraction of divine law ? It is He who says, " / kill^ and I make alive " — 
(Deut xxxii. 39). God, and not the devil, reigns. God dispenses retribution, 
and enforces His own law ; not a hostile archangel, presumed to be at eternal 
enmity with him. John says, " For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, 
that he might destroy the woi'ks of the deviV^ — (1 John iii. 8). Will Jesus 
effect the purpose of his manifestation ? If so (and who will deny it ?) will he 
not accomplish the overturn of all that is done by the Bible devil ? Will he 
not destroy all liis works ? If so, it follows, if the Bible devil is a personal 
devil, with a blazing hell choke full of damned souls, that Christ will put out 
his hell, liberate his wretched captives, and abolish himseK. If the Bible devil 
is the orthodox devil, and human beings are immortal souls, universalism is 
undoubtedly Scriptural ; for Christ has come to "destroy the devil and aUhis 
works : but there is no devil of the supernatural order, and no immortal souls. 
The devil Christ has come to destroy is sin. If any one doubts this, let him 
reconsider Paul's words quoted above. What did Christ accomplish in his 
death ? Let the following testimonies answer : 

'•He put away sin hy the sacrifice of himself.'*' — Heb. ix. 26. 

*' Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures."—! Cor. xv. 3. 

" He was wounded for our transgressions ; he was bruised for our iniquities " — 
Isaiah liii. 5. 

"His own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree." — 1 Peter iL 24. 

" He was manifested to take away our sinb." — 1 John iii. 5. 

Christ, through death, destroyed, or took out of the way, " the sin of the 
world." In this, he destroyed the Bible devil. He certainly did not destroy 
the popular devil in his death, for that devil is supposed to be still at large ; 
but in his own person, as a representative man, he extinguished the power of 
sin by surrenderiag to its full consequences, and then escaping by resurrection, 
through the power of his own holiness, to, live for evermore. This is New 



171 

Testamentally described as " God sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful 
flesh, and for sin, condemned 'szVi in the flesh'' — (Rom. viii. 3). Sin in the flesh, 
then, is the devil destroyed by Jesus in his death. This is the devil havi7ig the 
power of deatlh, for it is sin, and nothing else but sin, that causes death to the 
intelligent creatures of Jehovah's hand. Does anyone doubt this ? Let him 
read the following testimonies : 

"By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin^^ — Bom. v. 12. 

^'By man came death " — 1 Cor. xv. 21. 

" The wages of sin is death ' — Rom. vii. 23. 

" Sin hath reigned unto death "—Rom. v. 21. 

*' Sin bringeth forth death.'' — James i. 15. 

« The sting of death is Sin "—1 Cor. xv. 56. 
Having regard to the fact that death was divinely decreed in the garden of 
"Eden, in consequence of Adam' s transgression^ it is easy to understand the 
language which recognises and personifies transgression, or sin, as the power or 
cause of death. The foregoing statements express the literal truth metonymically. 
Actually, death, as the consequence of sin, is produced, caused, or inflicted ly 
God^ but since sin or transgression is the fact or principle that moves God to 
inflict it. sin is very appropriately put forward as the first cause in the matter. 
This is intelligible to the smallest intellect : but what has a personal devil to 
do with it ? He is excluded. There is no place for him. And if he is forced 
into the arrangement, the result is to change the moral situation, alter the 
scheme of salvation, and produce confusion : for if the power of death lies with 
a personal power of evil, separate from and independent of man, and not in 
man's own sinfulness, then the operations of Christ are transferred from the 
arena of moral conflict to that of physical strife, and the whole scheme of divine 
interposition through him is degraded to a level with the Pagan mythologies, 
in which gods, good and bad, are represented to be in murderous physical- 
force hostility for the accomplishment of their several ends. God is thus 
brought down from His position of supremacy, and placed on a footing with 
the forces of his own creation. 

But, the objector, unable to escape the force of Scripture testimony, may say, 
True, sin is the cause of death ; but who prompts the sin ? Is it not here that 
the devil of popular belief has his work ? No Bible answer can be more to the 
point than the following : " Every man is tempted when he is drawn away of 
HIS OWN" LUST, and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin^ 
and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death." — (James i, 14, 15.) This 
agrees with a man's own experience of himself ; sin originates in the untrained 
natural inclinations". These, in the aggregate, Paul terms " another law in 



172 

my members, warring against the law of my mind." Every man is conscious 
of the existence of this law, whose impulse, uncontrolled, would drive him 
against the dictates of wisdom. The world obeyeth this law, and " lieth in 
wickedness." It has no experience of the other law, which is implanted by 
the truth. " All that is in the world" John defines to be " the lust of the 
eyCfthelust of the flesh, and the pride of life'' — (1 John ii. 16.) When a 
man becomes enlightened in the truth, and is thus made aware of God's wiU 
in reference to the state of his mind and the nature of his actions, a new law 
is introduced. This is styled "the spirit," because the ideas upon which it is 
based have been evolved by the spirit, through inspired men. " The words 
that I speak unto you," says Jesus, ''Hhey are sjnrit, and they are life," — 
(John vi. 63.) Hence the warfare established in a man's nature by the 
introduction of the truth is a warfare of the two prraciples — the desires of 
the flesh and the commands of the spirit. This is described by Paul in the 
following words : *' The flesh lusteth against the spirit^ and the spirit against 
the flesh, and these are contrary the one to the other." — (Gal. v. 17.) "Walk 
in the spirit," says he, " and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh'' — (verse 
16.) He says in another place, "Let not sin, therefore, reign in your mortal 
body, that ye should obey it in the Insts thereof." — ^om. vi. 12.) These 
principles seem brought to a focus in the following extract from his letter to 
the Roman ecclesia : — 

" For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh ; but they that 
are after the spirit, the things of the spirit. For to be carnally-minded is death, but 
to be spiritually-minded, is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against 
God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can it be. So then they 
that are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh, but in the 
Spirit, if so be that the spirit of God dwell in you. Now, if any man have not the 
Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. . . . Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, 
not to the flesh to live after the flesh. For if ye live after the flesh ye shall die ; 
but, if ye through the Spirit, do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For as 
many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God."— Eom. viii. 5-9, 
12-14. 

In view of these declarations of Scripture, the suggestion that the personal 
devil's work is to suggest sin, has no place. It is idle, false, and mischievous. 
It puts a man off his guard to think he is all right if the devil let him alone. 
There is no devil but his own iuclinations, which tend to illegitunate activity. 
These are the origin of sia, and sin is the cause of death. Both together are 
the devil. "He that committeth sin is of the devil." — (1 John ui. 8.) But why, 
it may be asked, should such a plaiu matter be obscured by personification ? 
No other answer can be given than that it is one of the Bible's peculiarities to 
deal in imagery where the principles involved are too subtle for ready literal 
expression. The world, which is merely an aggregation of persons, is 



173 

personified : " If ye were of the world, the world would love his own." — 
(John XV. 19.) 

EiCHES AEE peesonified: 

"No man can serve two masters. . . . , Ye cannot serve God aad 

Mammon."— Matt. vi. 24. 

Sin is peesonified: 

" Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin.''— John viii. 34. 

" Sin hath reigned unto death. — Eom. v. 21. 

" Know ye not that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye 
are to whom ye obey, whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness ? 
Being then made free from sin, ye became the servants of 
EiGHTEOUSNEss." — Rom. vi. 16, 18. 

The Spieit is personified: 

"When HE, the Spirit of truth is come, he will guide you into all truth j for he 
shall not speak of himself." — John xvi. 13. 

Wisdom is personified: 

" Happy is the man that findeth wisdom and the man 1hat getteth understanding. 
, . . She is more precious than rubies, and all the things that tliou canst 

desire are not to be compared unto her. Length of days is in l.er right hand, and in 
her left hand riches and honour." — Prov. iii. 13, 15. 

"Wisdom hath builded her house; she hath hevvn out her seven pillars.'' — 
Prov. ix. 1. 

The nation of Iseael is personified : 

"Again I will build thee, and thou shalt be built, 0, Virgin of Israel; thou shalt 
ajain be adorned with thy tabrets."— Jer, xsxi. 4. 

"I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning /imseZ/ thus: Thou hast chastised me, 
and I was chastised as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke ; turn thou me, and I 
shall be turned ; for thou art the Lord my God." — Jer. xxxi, 18. 

The People of Cheist aee peesonified : 
" Till we all come in the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God 

unto A PERFECT MAN. ' — Eph. iv. 13. 

" There is one body."— Eph. iv. 4. 

" Ye are the body op Christ." — 1 Cor. xii. 27. 

" Christ is the head of the church, and he is the saviour of the body."- Eph. v. 2S.' 

" He is the head of the body, the church. . . .1 fill up that whicli is 

behind of the afflictions of Christ, in my flesh for his body's sake, which is tho 
church."— Col. i. 18, 24. 

" I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virnin 
to Christ."— 2 Cor. xi. 2. 

" The marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready." - 
Eev. xix. 7. 



174 

The NATTTRAL disposition to evil which a man forsakes on BEC03«nN(J 

Oheist's, and also the new state of mind developed in the teuth, 

AEE personified: 

'|Ye have put off the old man with his deeds."— Col. iii. 9. 

" Put off, concerning the former conversation the old man which is corrupt, 
according to the deceitful lusts . . . put on the new man, which, after 

<jod is created in righteousness and true holiness." — Eph. iv. 22, 24. 

Our old man is crucified with him.'" — Rom. vi. 6. 

*rnE spirit of disobedience which dwells in "THE WORLD IS PERSONIFIED t 

*' Wherein in time past ye walked, according to the course of this world, according 
to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now wobketh in the 
CHILDREN OF DISOBEDIENCE, among whom also we all had our conversation in times 
J)ast in the lusts ofourjlesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind." — Eph. ii. 
2,3. 

** Now is the judgment of this world. Now shall the prince op this world be 
'cast out, and I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. This 
he said signifying what death he should die " — John xii. 31-33. 

Now these proofs and examples of personification furnish an answer to the 
t[uestion why sin in the abstract should be personified. They show, first, that 
principles and things a7'e personified in the Bible ; and, second, that this is done 
with great advantage. A metaphorical dress to abstractions gives a palpability 
fco them in discourse, which they would lack if stated in precise and literal 
iiinguage. There is a warmth in such a style of speech, which is awanting in 
expressions that conform to the strict proprieties of grammar and fact. This 
Warmth and expressiveness are characteristic of the Bible in every part of it, 
and belong tc the Oriental languages generally. Of course it is open to abuse, 
like every other good, but its effectiveness is beyond question. The subject in 
hand is an illtistration. Sin is the great slanderer of God in virtually denying 
His supremacy, wisdom, and goodness, and the great ground of accusation 
against man^, even unto death. How appropriate, then, to style it the accuser, 
THE SLANDERER, THE LIAR* This is douc in the word devil ; but through the 
word not being translated, but merely Anglicised, the English reader, reared 
X^^ith English theological prejudices, is prevented from seeing it. 

There is an historical aspect to the question, which greatly tends to place the 
matter in an intelligible light. We refer to the fact stated by Paul : — '* By one 
inan sin entered into the world," If we recal the incidents of this occurrence, 
\ve shall see a peculiar fitness in the personification of sin in the word devil. 
Adam committed an act of disobedience, whidi was sin, being " the transgression 
of the law " laid down; but this act on his pa,rt was not spontaneous. It was 
^suggested by his wife ; but neither on her part was the disobedience self-* 
«^iggested^ She atjted ^t the instigatioa of a third party. Who was thatP Thd 



I 



175 

answer is, in the words of tlie record, '^ The seepent was more suhtle than any 
BEAST OP THE EiELD wliich the Lovd God had madeJ^ The natural serpent, more 
observant than other animals, and gifted for the time with the power of 
expressing its thoughts, reasoned upon the prohibition which G-od had put upon 
*' the tree in the midst of the garden ;" and concluding from all he saw and 
heard that death would not be the result of eating, he said, " Ye shall not surely 
die, for God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, your eyes shall be opened, 
ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil" — (G-en, iii. 4, 5). Thus the serpent 
was a slanderer, a calumniator of God, in affirming that what God had said was 
not true. Thus he became a devil, and not only a devil, but the devil, inasmuch 
as he originated the slander, under the belief of which our first parents 
disobeyed the divine command, and introduced sin and death to the world. He 
was, therefore, the natural symbol of all that resulted from his lie. " That old 
serpent^ which is the Devil and Satan," is the symbolic description of the world 
in its political totality at the time when Christ seizes upon " the kingdoms of 
this world," and turns them into "the kingdoms of our Lord and his Christ" — • 
(Eev. XX. 1 ; xi. 15). The serpent being the originator of the lie which led to 
disobedience, the fruits of that disobedience might well be said to be "his 
works." The individual serpent itself has long* since passed away in the course 
of nature, but the fruits remain and the principle lives. The idea instilled by 
it into the minds of our first parents has germinated to the production of 
g-enerations of human serpents. Mankind has proved but an embodiment of 
the serpent idea ; so that they are all calumniators of G-od in disbelieving His 
promises and disobeying His commandments. Hence Jesus could say to the 
Pharisees, " Ye serpents, how can ye escape the damnation of hell ? " — (Matt. 
xxiii. 33;) and again, "Ye are of your father the devil (slanderer — serpent), 
and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginrjng 
(he brought death upon mankind by inciting Adam and Eve to disobedience), 
and abode not in the truth because there was no truth in him. When he 
speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own ; for he is a liar and the father of it " — 
(John viii. 44). AU who are in the first Adam, are "the children of the devil," 
because they are the progeny of a serpent-devil contaminated paternity. Their 
mortality is evidence of this, whatever be their moral qualities, because 
mortality is the fruit of the serpent-devil conceit operating in Adam to 
disobedience. But those who, upon a belief of the promises of God, are 
introduced unto "the second Adam" (who in his death destroyed the bonds of 
the devil in taking away sin), are emancipated from the family of the devil, 
and become sons of God. 

Progeny is according to paternity; like produces like; "Children of the 
devil" must be devil ; and hence it is that the world of human nature as a whole 



176 



1 



is regarded as the de\T.l, because it is the embodiment o£ tt© devil principle^ 
That principle originated in a personal agent ; and for that reason the principle 
retains the personality of the originator in common discourse, for the sake of 
convenience ; and thus by a very natural process, the abstract principle which 
lies at the bottom of human reason and mortality is personified. Hence, Jesus 
destroying the devil and his works, is Jesus taking away the sin of the world, 
which will ultimate in the complete abolition of human nature, on the Adam or 
serpent basis, and the swallowing up of death in victory. It will be the 
suppression of the prevailing order of things, and the establishment of a new 
one, in which righteousness and peace will reign triumphant, and the knowledge 
of God will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. 

The temptation of Jesus is usually cited in opposition to these conclusions ; it 
is supposed that this ineontestibly proves the personality and power of the Bible 
devil. But a moment's reflection will dissipate this impression. The great 
feature of the narrative relied upon, is the application of the word " devil " to 
the tempter ; but this proves nothing. If Judas could be a devil, and yet be a 
man ( Jno. vi. 70), why may the tempter of Jesus not have been a man ? His 
being called ^' devil" proves nothing. But what about taking him to the 
pinnacle of the temple ? it wiU be asked : does it not require something more 
than human power to carry a man through the air to the top of a steeple ? If 
this was what happened, it would, doubtless, be a little difficult to explain ; but 
this is not so. The pinnacle of the temple, as we are informed by Josephus, was 
an elevated court or promenade, which, on one side, overlooked the depths of 
the valley of Jehosaphat, and offered the facility for self-destruction which the 
tempter asked Jesus to wantonly brave, on the strength of a promise made in 
reference tc ine-ST.table suffering. To this court, the tempter, doubtless, walked 
with Jesus, and made the vain proposal suggested by the circumstances. The 
objector wiU then point to Christ's conveyance to "a high mountain," from 
which the devil " showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of 
time." It is obvious that this must be taken in a limited sense ; for the fact of 
ascending a mountain, to see ovJiat was to he witnessed^ shows that the field of 
vision was in proportion to the altitude. From the top of one of the Syrian 
mountains, a radius of eighty or a hundred miles would be within range of the 
eye, and from the clearness of the atmosphere in the east, every part of the 
country so overlooked would be distinctly seen. The tract of country so seen 
woiJd be Judea. The offer of power would therefore relate to that country. If 
it be contended that Christ was absolutely and miraculously shown *' aU the 
kingdoms of the world," what shall be alleged as the reason for the tempter 
ascending an elevation to show him them ? This would have been no assistance 
to see "all" the countries on earth. If there was anything supernatural in 



177 

it; there was no necessity for going up a hill at all. But who was the devil 
who thus busied himself to subvert Jesus from the path of obedience ? The 
answer is, it is impossible to say positively v/ho he was. As in the case of Job's 
Satan, we can only be positive as to who he was not. The probability suggested 
by the fact that he had power to allot the provinces of the Roman world, is that 
he was a leading functionary of state, or the Eoman Emperor himself. It is 
easy to understand how such a personage should attempt to satisfy what he 
would suppose Christ's ambition, by ojffering him the dominion of Syria, on 
condition of doing homage to the political god of Rome', as all the kings of the 
Roman habitable did, far and near. The tradition of a Jewish Messiah, who 
should put down ail kings on earth, and exalt himself as universal ruler, was 
active and wide -spread at that period, and, just at the time of the temptation, 
the fame of Jesus, as the claimant to the Messiahship, was beginning to spread. 
It was not unnatural, under the circumstances, that Rome should seek by a 
stroke of policy to smother the rising revolution and buy ofi the opposition of 
him, who, by the world' «i rulers, would be regarded from the unholy stand-point 
of their own ambition. Ee these suggestions true or false, the temptation 
affords no real countenance to the theory that it is brought forward to prove. 
In fact, there ds no real countenance to the theory in any part of the Bible. 
The countenance is only apparent ; it is all an appearance, the chief power of 
which lies in the fact that there is a personal-devil theory of pagan origin 
extant, and taught from the days of infancy ; Bible words and pagan theories 
are put together and made to fit ; and superficially considered, the result is 
striking and impressive, and highly demonstrative of a personal devil. It is, 
however, a mere jug'gle and a deception of the most mischievous kind; a 
magic lantern contrivance by which, out of the dark box of ignorance, the 
sickly light of distorted information is made to flash forth upon the out-spread 
surface of know-nothingism, the hideous form of incarnate malignity which 
appears to sight as if real, while' it is nothing more than a shadow reflected 
from the slides of anciejit superstition. 

It would be unwise to conclude the subject without a few words on 
*' devils," in which the reader may see some lurking evidence of personal 
supernatural diabolism. As to the Old Testament, the word is onh^ found 
four times, viz., in Lev. xvii. 7 ; Deut. xxxii. 17 ; 2 Chron. xi. 15 ; and Psalm 
cvi. 37. These passages only require to be read for the reader to see, that so 
far as the Old Testament is concerned, the word " devils," in Bible use, is 
applied very differently from that wliich popular views of the subject would 
indicate. For instance : 

"They sacrificed unto d'm^s, not to God ; to gods ir/jom ihcy l-ncw not, to new 
eoDS that came newly up, whom your fathers feared not."— Deut. xxxii. 17. 



Here tne " devils *' sacrificed to by Israel were the idols of th.e heathen* 
This is still more apparent from Psalm cvi. 35, 37 : — 

"Tkey were mingled among the heathen and learned their works ; and they served 
their idols, which were a snare unto them — yea, they sacrificed their sons and their 
daughters unto devils, and shed innocent blood, even the blood of their sons and of 
their daughters, whom they sacrificed unto the idols of Canaan." 

It is needless to say that the idols of Canaan were " lifeless blocks of wood 
and stone," and that, therefore, their designation as "devils" shows that the 
Old Testament use of the word gives no countenance to the idea that " devils " 
are personal beings, of a malignant order, aiding and abetting, and serving 
the great devil in his works of mischief and damnation. 

But it is to the New Testament that the orthodox believer will point, as the 
great stronghold for this belief. Thither we shall go, and with a result, we 
shall find, as unavailing for the popular creed, as that which has attended all 
the foregoing endeavours. In the first place, Paul's use of the word in the 
same way as it is used in the Old Testament, suggests that Paul ignored the 
Pagan \dew of the matter. He says " The things which the Gentiles sacrifice, 
they sacrifice to devils, and not to God, and I would not that ye should have 
fellowship with devils. Ye cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of 
devils; ye cannot be partakers of the Lord's table and of the table of 
devils." — (1 Cor. x. 20, 21.) Now, that "devils" here applies to the idols of 
Pagan worship is manifest ; first, from the fact that the sacrifices of the 
Gentiles were offered at the shrines of the idol-gods of their own superstition ; 
and second, from the following words of Paul in tJie same chapter : " What 
say I then, that the idol is anything ? o?' that which is offered in sacrifice to 
THE IDOLS is anything ? " — (verse 19.) This is conclusive. Paul applies the 
word "devils" to idols, of which he says, "We know that an idol is 
NOTHixG in the world." — (1 Cor. viii. 4.) Ergo, the word " devils," as used 
by Paul, lends no countenance to the popular view. Of course, the reader 
will understand that " devils," in the original Greek, is a different word from 
that translated " devil." The distinction between the two must be recognised,, 
in order to appreciate the explanation applicable to "devils," as distinct from 
" devil." T\Tiile " devil " is, in the original diabolos, " devils " is the plural of 
daimon, which has a very different meaning from diabolos. Daimon is the 
name given by the Greeks to beings imagined by them to exist in the air, and 
to act a mediatorial part between God and man, for good or evil. These 
imaginary beings would be expressed in English by demon, evil genius, or 
tutelar deity, all of which belong to Pagan mythology, and have no place in 
the system of the truth. We quote the following observations on the subject 
from Parkhurst's Greek Lexicon in exempMcation of the origin of the idea! 



179 

"Daimonion, from daimon—a deity, a god, or more accurately, some power or 
supposed intelligence in that grand object of heathen idolatry, the material heavens 
or air. Thus the word is generally applied by the LXX, who use it, Isa. Ixv. 11, for the 
destructive troop or powers of the heavens, in thunder, lightning, storm, &c., in 
Deut. xxxii. 17 ; Psalm cv. 35, for the pourers forth or genial powers of nature ; ani, as 
by the mid-day demon, Psalm xci. 6, we may be certain they intended not a dev:I, 
but a pernicious blast of air — Comp. Isa. xxviii. 2 — in the Hebrew ; so from this and 
the forecited passages, we can be at no loss to know what they meant, when in their 
translation of Psal. xcvi. 5, they say, All the Gods of the Gentiles are daimonia, 
i.e. not devils, but some powers or imaginary intelligence of material nature. , 
. Most expressive are the words of Plato in Sympos. ' Every demon is a middle 
being between God and mortal men.' If you ask what he means by " middle 
being," he will tell you, ' God is not approached immediately by man, but all the 
commerce and intercourse between gods and men is performed by the medial iou 
of demons.' Would you see the particulars ? ' Demons are reporters and carriers 
from men to the gods, and again from the gods to men, of the supplications and 
prayers of the one, and of the injunctions and rewards of devotion from the other. 
Besides those original material mediators, or the intelligence, residing in them, 
whom Apuleius caUs a higher kind of demons, who were always free from the 
incumbrances of the bodj^, and out of which higher order Plato supposes that 
guardians were appointed unto men. Besides these, the heathen acknowledged 
another sort, namely, 'the souls of men deified or canonized after death.' So 
Hesiod, one of the most ancient heathen ^mters, describing that happy race of men 
who lived in the first and golden age of the world, saith that ' after this generatioa 
were dead, they were, by the will of great Jupiter, i^romoted to be demons, keei era 
of mortal men, observers of their good and evil works, clothed in air, always walking 
about the earth, givers of riches ; and this, saith he, ' is the royal honour that they 
enjoy.' Plato concurs with Hesiod, and asserts that he and many other poets speak 
excellently, who affirm that when good men die, they attain great honour and 
dignity, and become demons.' The same Plato, in another place, maintains that 
* all those who die valiantly in war, are of Hesiod's golden generation, and are made 
demons, and that we ought for ever after to serve and adore their sepulchres as the 
sepulchres of demons. The same also,' says he, ' we decree whenever any of those 
who were excellently good in life, die, either of old age or in ony other manner.' . 
, . According to Plutarch, tom. i. p. 958, E. edit. Xylandr, it was a very 

ancient opinion that there were certain wicked and malignant demons who envy good 
men, and endeavour to disturb and hinder them in the pursuit of virtue, lest remaining 
firm (unfallen) in goodness and uncorrupt, they should, after death, obtain a better 
lot than they themselves enjoy.'" 

In view of the heathen origin of this "doctrine of demons," it is a natural 

source of wonder that it should appear so largely interwoven with the gospel 

narratives, and receive apparent sanction both from Christ and his disciples. 

This can only be accoimted for on one principle ; the Grecian theory that 

madness, epileptic disorders, and obstructions of the senses, (as distinct from 

ordinary diseases) were attributable to demoniacal possession, had existed many 

centuries before the time of Christ, and had circulated far and wide with tho 

Greek language, which, in these days, had become nearly universal. The theory 

necessarily stamped itself upon the common language of the time, and supplied 

a nomenclature for certain classes of disorders which, Avithout reference to the 

particular theory in which it originated, would become current andeunventioneal^ 



180 



1 



and used by all classes as a matter of course, without involving an acceptance 
of the Pagan belief. Ou the face of it, the nomenclature vrould carry that 
belief ; but in reality it would only be used from the force of universal custom, 
without any reference to the superstition w^hich originated it. We have an 
illastration of this in our word " lunatic," which originated in the idea that 
madness was the result of the moon's influence, but which nobody now uses to 
express that idea. The same principle is exemplifled in the phrases "bewitched," 
"fairy-like," "hobgoblin," "dragon," "the king's evil," "St. Vitus' s dance," 
&c., all of which are freely used denominatively, without subjecting the person 
using them to the charge of believing the fictions originally represented by them. 

Christ's conformity to popular language did not commit him to popular 
delusions. In one case, he apparently recognizes the god of the Philistines : 
" Ye say that I cast out demons through Beelzebub : ill by Beelzebub cast out 
demons, by whom do your children cast them out ? " — (Matt. xii. 27.) Now, 
Beelzebub signifies the god of fiies, a god worshipped by the Philistines of 
Ekron (2 Kings i. 6), and Christ, in using the name, takes no pains to dwell 
upon the fact that Beelzebub was a heathen fiction, but seems rather to 
assume, for the sake of argument, that Beelzebub t^as a- reality ; it was a 
mere accommodation to the language of his opponents. Yet; this might, with 
as much reason, be taken as proof of his belief in Beelzebub, as his 
accommodation to popular speech on the subject of demons is taken to sanction 
the common idea of " devils." 

The casting out of demons spoken of in the New. Testament was nothing 
more or less than the curing of epileptic fits and brain disorders, as distinct 
from bodily diseases. Of this, any one may be satisfied by an attentive 
reading of the narrative and a close consideration of the symptoms, as recorded. 

" Lord have mercy on my son, for he is lunatic and sore vexed, for ofttimes lie 
f alletli into the fire, and oft into the w'ater ; and I brought him to thy disciples, and 

they could not cure him And Jesus rebuked the devil, (demon) 

and he departed out of him." — Matt. xvii. 15, 18. 

From this, the identity of lunacy with su]3posed diabolical possession is 

apparent. The expulsion of the malarious influence which deranged the 

child's faculties was the casting out of the demon. 

" Then -was brought unto him one possessed with a devil, blind and dumb ; and he 
healed him, insomuch that the blind and duvih both spake and saw." — Matt, xii, 22. 

" And one of the multitude answered and sai'i, Master, I have brought unto thee 
my son, which hath a dumb spirit.'' — Mark ix. 17. 

There is no case of demoniacal possession mentioned in the New Testament, 
which has not its parallel in hundreds of instances in the medical experience of 
the present time. The symptoms are precisely identical — tearing, foaming at 
the mouth, crpng out, abnormal strength, kc. Tnie, there are no exclamations 



181 

about the Messiah, becaiise there is no popular excitement on the subject for 
them to reflect in an aberrated form, as there was in the days of Jesus, when the 
whole Jewish community was pervaded by an intense expectation of the 
Messiah, and agitated by his wonderful works. The transference of "the 
devils " to the swine, is only an instance in which Christ vindicated the law 
(which prohibited the culture of the pig), by acting on the suggestion of a 
madman in transferring an aberrating influence from the latter to the swine, 
and causing their destruction. The statement that the devils made request, or 
the devils cried out this or that, must be interpreted in the light of a self- 
evident fact, that it was the person possessed who spoke, and not the abstract 
malaria, which caused the derangement. The insane utterances were 
attributable to the insanifying influence, and, therefore, it is an allowable 
liberty of speech to say that the influence — called in the popular phrase of 
these times, demon or demons — spoke them ; but, in judging of the theory of 
possession, we must carefully separate between critical statements of truth 
and rough popular forms of speech, which m.erely embody an aspect, and not 
the essence of truth. 

It is needless to say more on the subject ; enough has been advanced to show 
the unfounded and mischievous nature of popular views, and to furnish a key 
for the solution of all Scripture texts which appear to favour those views. 
This accomplishment, if successfully achieved, will suffice for the present 
effort. The doctrine of a personal devil or devils, is a spiritual miasma ; it is 
itself an evil spirit, of which a man must become dispossessed before he can 
become mentally clothed, and in his right mind. It obscures the shining 
features of divine truth from the gaze of all who are subject to it, involving 
in horrible mystery the dealings of Almighty power, all of whose ways are 
wisdom. It throws a cloud, as from a smoking pit, over the face of heaven's 
great luminary, obstructing the vision, and causing the mental eyes to smart ; 
and ultimately suffocating to death the wretched people who are embraced in 
its deadly shroud. It is a feature of the general corruption of doctrine 
which set in during the very days of the apostles, and has ended in maldng the 
word of God utterly without effect. It is companion to the immortality of 
the soul, to which, with other fables of heathen invention, men have universally 
turned according to Paul's prediction (2 Tim. iv. 3, 4) ; and, in accepting 
which, they have necessarily rejected the truth proclaimed by all the servants 
of God, from Enoch to Paul. We, therefore, point at it the finger of 
execration and warning, in. the hope that honest souls may throw off its 
power, and, coming into the light, rejoice in the good hope of rising at Christ's 
appearing from the bondage of this corrupt order of things, to the glorious 
liberty of the children of God I 



182 



LECTURE VI, 



THE KINGDOM OF GOB— NOT YET IN EXISTENCE, BUT TO BE 
ESTABLISHED VISIBLY ON THE EARTH AT A FUTURE DAY. 

"What is the Kingdom of God ? We put this forward as one of the most 
important questions that can be asked from a Scriptural point of view 
whatever it is, it was the geeat subject mattee of the gospel peeached by 
Jesus axd his apostles. This we prove by the following citation of j 
testimonies : — 

" And Jesus "went about all Galilee teaching in their synagogues, and preaching 
the gospel of the kingdom.'^ — Matt. iv. 23. 

" And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, 
and preaching the gospel of the kingdom." — Matt. ix. 85. 

"Now after that John was put in prison, Jesus came into GaMlee, preaching the 
gospel of the kingdom of GodJ' — Mark i. 14. 

" He (Jesus) said unto them, I must preach the kingdom of God to other cities also ; 
for therefore am I sent."— Luke iv. 43. 

" And it came to pass afterwards that he went throughout every city and village, 
preaching and showing the glad tidings of the kingdom of God." — Luke viii. 1. 

" Tl^en he called his twelve disciples together, and gave them power and 
authority over all devils, and to cure diseases, and he sent them to preach the kingdom 
of God."— Luke ix. 1, 2. 

" And he took them and went aside privately into a desert place belonging to the 
city called Bethsaida ; and the people when they knew it followed him and he 
received the people, and ipake unto them of the kingdom of God.'' — Luke ix. 10, 11. 

The ministers and clergy of the present day believe that they preach the 
gospel in setting before the people the death of Christ as a propitiatory 
sacrifice, but it must be obvious that they come very far short of preaching 
the gospel which was proclaimed by Jesus and the apostles. The foregoing 
testimonies show this. In addition to these, there is the significant fact that. 
Christ and his disciples preached the gospel three years before the crucifixioriy 
showing that it could not relate to that event, which was yet unaccomplished. 
This is conclusively shown in the fact that though the disciples "went.^ 
throughout the towns, preaching the gospel" (Luke ix. 6), they were n 
arvare that Christ had to suffer, Christ frequently told his disciples that 
should " suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders and chief priests^l 



I 



183 

and scribes, and be slain, and be raised again the tMrd day" (Lnke ix. 22) ; but 
it is said ^''tJiey understood not this saying^ and it was hid from them that they 
perceived it not'' — (Luke ix. 45.) Yet they preached the gospel, which is 
proof of the most positive character that the death of Christ did not, 
constitute any element of the gospel as preached by them. They did not take, 
it into account in their preachings. There must, therefore, be something 
radically defective in the gospel of modern times, which consists exclusively 
of that fact and its co-relevants. 

This "something" appears, by the foregoing testimonies, to have been 
"the KmanoM or God." The following passages prove that the kingdom 
was also preached by the apostles after Christ's death, resurrection, and 
ascension, and that it, therefore, continues a valid and essential element of the 
gospel to this day :— 

"Bttt when they (the Samaritans) believed Philip, preaching the things 
CONCERNING THE KINGDOM OP GoD, and the name of Jesus Christ, they were 
baptised, both men and women." — Acts viii. 12. 

" He went into the synagogue, and spake boldly for the space of three months, dAS' 
puting and persuading the things concerning the kingdom oe God."— Acts xix. 8, 

" He expounded and testified the kingdom op God, persuading them concerning 
Jesus, both out of the law of Moses, and out of the prophets." — Acts xxviii. 23 

" And received all that came in unto him, preucMng the Kingdom op God, and 
teaching those thngs that concern the Lord Jesus Christ." — Acts xxviii. 29-30. 

" Among whom, I {Paul) have gone preaching the kingdom of God." — Acts xx. 25. 

Kow Paul was exceedingly zealous that the same gospel which he himself 
po'cached, should be continued to be preached to the end of the world. " If 
an angel from heaven," said he, " preach any other gospel than that which we 
have preached unto you, let him be accursed." — (Gal. i. 8.) Hence the gospel, 
of which he said it was the power of God unto salvation to everyone that 
belie veth (Eom. i. 16), embraces the doctrine of the kingdom of God, whatever 
that may be; for he himself continually preached it to both Jews and 
Gentiles. 

We repeat that, in these circumstances, the question we have propounded i? 
the most important to which attention can be invited. 

What then is the kingdom of God ? Different answers will be given to the 
question by different classes of people. Some conceive it to consist of the 
supremacy of God in the hearts of men — a sort of spiritual dominion existing 
co-extensively with secular life. Others recognize it in the ecclesiastical 
organizations of tli^ day, styling them, as a whole, Christendom, or the 



184 

kingdom of Christ ; while a third party behold it in uni»versal nature, 
continuing from generation to generation. 

The holders of the first idea find a sanction for their belief in the words of 
Chiist : " The kingdom of God is within you." — (Luke xvii. 21.) They over- 
look the fact, however, that these words were addressed to the Pharisees, of 
whom Jesus said " Ye outwardly appear righteous unto men, hut within ye 
are full of hypocrimj and iniquity y — (Matt, xxiii. 28.) This is not the state 
of mind that exists where the kingdom of God is supposed to dwell ; and the 
fact that the statement in question was addressed to men of this character, 
shows that it had not the significance generally claimed for it. If the reader 
will examine any marginal Bible, he will find that *' among" is given as the 
true rendering of the word translated "within;" which so far destroys the 
apparent import of the word in question ; and when it is known that the word 
hasileia, translated kingdom, also means royalty, or kingly dignity, {vide 
Parkhurst, under hasileus, a king',) he will have no difficulty in perceiving that 
Christ, in uttering them, only meant to intimate his own presence among 
them as " the Royalty of the heavens," in answer to the mocking enquiry of 
the Pharisees. Romans xiv. 17, is also quoted by the same class of believers : 
*' The kingdom of God is not meat and drink ; but righteousness, peace, and 
joy in the Holy Ghost ; " but this only affirms one truth, without destroying 
another. It is true the kingdom of God, when established, will be based on 
the qualities enumerated by Paul ; but it does not therefore foUow that the 
kingdom of God wiU not be a real and glorious manifestation of God's power 
on earth, through the personal intervention of His Son from heaven. 

The second idea, that the kingdom of God is to be found in the religious 
systems of the day, as " the visible church," is so entirely without the sem- 
blance of Scriptural foundation, as to compel its summary dismissal with the 
remark — made on the strength of what is to follow in the present and succeed- 
ing lectures — that never was a more egregious doctrinal mistake conmiitted by 
man. 

The third view, which regards the universe as "the kingdom of God," has 
more of truth in it than the first or second, and yet as much of error. The 
wide domain of nature is certainly the dominion of the Deity in a very exalted 
sense ; but is it this which in the Scriptures is spoken of as "the kingdom of 
God " in relation to this world and human affairs ? Assuredly not. We are 
bold to make +Ms answer, because of abundant Scriptural testimony, which is 
forthcoming. 

On what principle shall we determine the meaning of this phrase, " The 
Kingdom of God ? " Obviously by tracing the phrase to its origin, and ascer- 
taining as a matter of fact, what was its import when first introduced. 



185 

Adopting tliis plan, we find that the phrase is used in contrast to " the king- 
dom of men," which occurs three times in Daniel iv. — see verses 17, 25, 32. 
The "kingdom of men" has existed on the earth since the days of Nimjod: 
it consists of the aggregate of human governments, and is very appropriately 
60 styled, since all human government is the emhodiment of one principle — 
namely, the rule of man by himself. Whether it be the despot or free 
Parliament, the same idea is exemplified — self-government. This has been 
the alpha and omega of all political faith, since the day when man first ignored 
the prerogative of the Highest, and began to assert the right to govern him- 
self. Its application has varied in different ages and countries, according to 
the views and inclinations of men. We have had despotisms, and republics, 
and constitutional and various other kinds of government, but though men 
have differed, and that fiercely, as to which ought to be enforced in the several 
countries, they have agreed with marvellous unanimity as to the mainspring 
of the system. There has been no difference between the bitterest factions as 
to the source of the power they respectively claimed to exercise, namely, the 
will of man. This is the comer-stone of every political edifice that exists — 
the foundation of the vast system of nations that covers the face of the earth. 

t No one ever questions the legitimacy of human authority as politically embod- 
ied. The fact is, the world knows of no other authority. If it believe in God, 
a false theology has excluded Him from any influence in the minds of men in 
things practical. They confine His jurisdiction to "spiritual things," to 
which a perverted significance has come to be attached ; and even in these, 
they only yield Him a constrained and occasional deference. In reality, they 
acknowledge Him not. They own no higher authority than themselves. 
They assert the right to be their own masters, to dispose of this world's wealth 

• as they think fit, and to make such laws as they please. This spirit is embodied 
in all the kingdoms of the world, from proud Albion, the queen of the sea, to 

i the petty tribes of Africa. It is the germ from which they are developed ; so 
that in a peculiar and emphatic sense, human government, as multifari- 
ously manifested on the face of the globe, is the kingdom of men. 

i It is the presumption of man politicaUy incorporated, the organised en- 
forcement of human dictate irrespective of the authority of God. It is 
permitted of God as, in the circumstances, a necessary evil ; and Pie overrules 
it with a view to His future purposes. " The Most High ruleth in the 
kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever He will." — (Dan. iv. 32.) 

Still, the fact remains the same, that in the world, we behold universally 
established, the kingdom of men, from which, by contrast, we are enabled to 
form an idea of 



186 

The Kingdom of God. 
This kingdom is not yet in existence. If it were, tlie government of the 
world would not long remain in the hands of unauthorised, ambitious, erring 
kings and rulers. When the kingdom of God comes, it wiU displace every 
power in the world, and not only displace them, but destroy them, and afterwards 
be estabKshed as a visible manifestation of God's power on the earth, through 
the persons of Christ and his saints, and a compulsory enforcement of his 
authority — ^all which will be made manifest to the reader in what is to follow. 
For a general \dew of the subject, let the reader turn to the second chapter of 
Daniel, and give it a careful reading ; and should he have any misgivings as 
to the possibility of understanding the prophet, let him remember the words of 
Christ to his disciples, "When ye shall see the abomination of desolation 
spoken of hy Daniel the prophet^ standing where it ought not, (let him that 
READETH UNDERSTAND)," &c. — (Mark xiii. 14.) With this exhortation from 
the mouth of Christ, let the reader fearlessly attempt the reading of the 
chapter referred to. Assuming that he has deliberately gone through it, we 
may remark that it is a revelation of the most important kind. It is, in fact, 
the history of the world condensed in the form of a prophecy into a single 
chapter, but in order to understand its bearing, we must endeavour to tran- 
sport ourselves into the past by upwards of a score of centuries, and take our 
stand, in imagination, with Nebuchadnezzar, the representative of the first 
great imperial dynasty. We fijid the monarch in reverie. He is thinking of 
his past achievements ; of his briUiant career, and the fame and the dominion 
which he has established by his might and prowess ; and while reviewing the 
past, his mind turns to the future. "Thy thoughts," says Daniel, "came into 
thy mind, upon thy bed, what should come to pass hereafter." He wonders 
who shall be after him, and what shall be the ultimate issue of affairs. Should 
the great empire, which he had founded, be a haven for nations throughout all 
generations ? or should some one rise after his death, and cause disruption and 
ruin P What would be the fate of the usurper ? Should his power continue ? or 
should it share a similar fate to his own ? Should the world be a constant 
battle-field? Should history be an eternal record of strife and bloodshei?J 
Should mankind for ever be cursed with the rivalries of unscrupulous potentates, I 
and the ravages of invading armies ? In this frame of mind, the monarch f aUs | 
asleep ; and while his slumbers are upon him, a dream is daguerreotj^ed upon j 
the tablets of his brain by the Great Artificer, who hath the hearts of all men J 
in His hands. The dream is for the purpose of solving the questions which 
had started into his mind, and of enlightening future o-enerations as to the 
purpose of the Almighty. The king awakes ; but the dream is gone. He only 
Icnows that he has had a dream of unusual impressiveness, but cannot recal its 



187 

faintest outline. In his distress, lie has recourse to the magicians of his court; 
but the demand is too great for their feeble resources, and they confess their 
inability to supply information which was beyond everybody's natural reach. 
Daniel is called in, and the king's difficulty is at an end. Now, let us take 
notice of Daniel's first statement to the king; ^' There is a Grod in heaven that 
revealeth secrets, and maheth known to the king Nebuchadnezzar what shall he 
in THE LATTEE DAYS." — (chap. ii. 28.) The first general fact to be noted, is that 
the vision, as a whole, relates to the developments of ^' the latter days^'^^di. 
phrase which is invariably employed in Scripture to describe the closing period 
of human affairs. This gives it a special interest to us, as affecting our own and 
future times, up to the preternatural consummation declared. Now it is of 
importance to note the details of the dream, with the view of properly 
apprehending the interpretation. The royal dreamer beholds a towering image 
composed of various metals — its proportions gigantic, and the general outline 
imposing and magnificent — forming a distinct, complete, self-contained object 
in the vision. As the beholder looks, a second independent object is 
introduced. A stone hewn by mysterious agency from an adjoining mountain 
comes upon the scene — not in a quiescent state, but whizzing through the air ; 
and (let the result be particularly noted) it strikes the great image on the 
feet with such destructive violence that the image is shivered to atoms, and 
falls in a cloud of dust, which is carried away by the wind. The two things 
are not contemporaneous ; they don't exist together at the same time. The 
image is first seen towering in its metallic splendour, then the stone is 
revealed, not as a passive co-existent, but as a directly antagonistic, body. 
There is no affinity between the two things : the stone does not move softly up to 
the image, and gradually incorporate itself with the substance of the other. 
It dashes at it with violence, and at once brings it to the earth in ruins ; and 
when the wind has cleared away the atomic residuum, the stone grows into a 
great mountain to the filling of the whole earth. In doing so, it does not 
appropriate any of the substance of the demolished image, as that has all been 
driven away ; but grows by its own inherent force. 

Now the things signified must, undoubtedly, bear the same mutual relations 
as the symbols, and we find that this is the case in the interpretation given by 
Daniel : — 

" Thou, O King, art king of kings : for the Ood of heaven hath given thee a 
kingdom, power and strength, and glory. . . . Thou [or thy dynasty] art 

this head of gold, and after thee shall arise another kingdom, inferior to thee, and 
another third kingdom of brass, which shall bear rule over all the earth ; and the 
fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron, forasmuch as iron breaketh in pieces and 
subdueth all things, and as iron that breaketh all things shall it break in pieces and 
bruise ; and whereas thou sawest the feet and toes, part of potters' clay and part of 
iron, the kingdom shall be divided j » . .it ehall be partly strong and 



188 

partly broken . . . And in the days of these kings, shall the God of 

heaven set up a kingdom which shall never be destroyed, and the kingdom shall not 
be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, 
and it shall stand for ever; forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone was cut out of 
the mountain without hands, and that it brake in pieces, the iron, the brass, the clay, 
the silver, and the gold."— ii. 37-45. 

Before considering these statements, it Tvill be of advantage to take into 
account the 7th chapter of Daniel, where the same things are revealed in 
another form. If the reader will take the trouble of reading the chapter 
through, he will be rewarded by a clearer comprehension of the scope of the 
argument. It narrates a vision seen by Daniel himseK, and interpreted to him 
by the angels. In the vision, beasts are substituted for Nebuchadnezzar's 
metals, and the stone finds its counterpart in the " judgment that shall sit, and 
consume and destroy the fourth beast unto the end." In the two, we have a 
double representation of the same thing. Their gTeat prophetic teaching is, 
that there were to arise in the earth four successive phases or forms of 
universal government, and that the fourth should be superseded by an 
everlasting kingdom, to be established by divine agency. The visions are of 
the broad and comprehensive type. They deal not with local manifestation. 
They take the civilized world as a whole, and present us with a general view 
of the great successive political phases of the world's history, without touching 
upon the infinitude of detail which constitutes the material of historical 
writing. They were given to gratify the profitable curiosity that seeks to 
know the ultimate of history, and the destiny of the human race. The 
revelation was made in almost the earliest historic age, viz., during the reign 
of Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon. That is now nearly twenty-five 
centuries ago ; and it is our privilege to be able to trace its verification in the 
course of history, and thereby be prepared to look for its startling 
consummation. 

The empire established by Nebuchadnezzar was in existence at the time of 
the visions ; we recognize it in the golden head of the image, and in the eagle- 
winged lion of Daniel's dream, both of which are appropriate symbols of the 
Babylonian power — the one representing the splendour and magnificence of 
the empire, the other its supremacy among the nations. 

"After thee," said Daniel, "shall rise another Mngdom inferior to thee," 
and, therefore, represented by the inferior metal — silver. This prediction was 
fulfilled. An insurrection took place under Darius the Mede, in the days of 
Nebuchadnezzar's grandson, which resulted iu the complete overthrow of his 
d}Tiasty, and in the establishment of the Medo -Persian empire. The Median 
phase, however, only lasted for a short time. Darius died in two years, 
without a liueal successor, and the vacant throne was peacefully filled by 



189 

Cyrus the Persian, the rightful heir. The Persian phase continued 204 years 
and nine months, so that the Persian phase of the silver empire, was of a 
very much longer duration than the Median. This is signified by the bear in 
the second vision raising itself up en one side ; and in Daniel viii. by a ram 
with, two unecpud horns, oi which it is said (verse 3) ''one was higher than 
the other, a.nd the higher came wp last'^ — that is, the Persian phase of the second 
empire, which was the longer, was last in order. The reader is referred to the 
chapter itself for further detail. The bear, which in Daniel's vision is chosen to 
represent the Medo-Persian empire, is said to have had " three ribs in the mouth 
of it, between the teeth of it." "We must, therefore, find some peculiarity in the 
political constitution of the empire, to correspond with this figure ; and here 
it is : 

" It pleased Dariiis to get over the kingdom an hundred and twenty princes, which 
slaonld be over the whole kingdom, and over these thsee presidents, that the princes 
might give aceonnt unto him, and the king should have no damage." — Dan. vi. 1, 2. 

In these several particulars then, the prophecy was fully realised in the case 
of the second great djmasty which ruled the world. 

As to the intrcdncticn of the third kingdom, Darius Codomannus, the last 
occupant of the Medo-Persian throne, was defeated by Alexander, the 
Macedonian, otherv/ise "the Great," who entirely overthrew the power 
of the dominant empire. Then came the rule of the brazen-coated 
Greeks : Alexander became the sole emperor of the world, establishing 
"the third king^dom of brass;" but his dominion did not long 
remain intact. It had been written in explanation of a vision seen by Daniel 
(chap. viii. 21, 22). 

" The rough goat is the king of Grecia, and the great horn that is between his eyes is 
the first king. Now that being broken, whereas four stood up for it, four kingdoms shall 
stand up out of the nation, but not in his power." 

The same thing had been predicted in the following wordj (Daniel xi. 3, 4), 

" A mighty king shall stand up and rule with great dominion, and when he shall stand 

np, his kingdom shall be broken, and shall be divided towards the four winds of heaven, and 
not to his posterity, nor according to the dominion which he ruled. ' 

Now the fulfilment of these predictions was very remarkable. On the death 
of Alexander, his empire was divided among his four generals, and became 
established in /o?^r independent divisions^ "not in his power," as the angel had 
foretold ; for his power was not perpetuated by descendants, but shared among 
strangers. 

Proceeding a step farther, we find a fourth kingdom predicted — " strong as 
iron, breaking in pieces, and bruising." In one case, it is represented by the 



190 

iron legs, feet, and toes of the image, and in the other by a fourth beast with 
ten horns, which Daniel describes "dreadful and terrible and strong exceedingly, 
■with great iron teeth devouring and breaking in pieces, and stamping the residue 
with its (brazen-clawed) feet," Here again history supplies a signal verifica- 
tion of the prophecy. The Roman empire rose into powerful existence, and 
vanquishing the power of Greece, became mistress of the world, extending her 
dominion beyond the limits of any former dynasties, and estabhshing one of the 
strongest despotisms the world has ever seen. Her political qualities corres- 
ponded in every respect with the strong figures employed. She was " strong as 
iron," and " great, and dreadful, and strong exceedingly." The sagacity of her 
rulers, the extraordinary vigour of her imperial administration, the military 
skill of her generals, the discipline of her army, the strength of her laws, and 
the unlimited extent of her resources, combined to give her a strength of 
political organization which none of her predecessors ever attained. This state 
of things, however, did not continue. The langniage of the vision required that 
days of weakness should come. " Partly strong Qjudivartly brolten ; " this is the 
prediction, and the fulfilment is ready to our hand. The days of universal 
Roman emperorship passed away ; the period of irresistible domination came to 
an end. Then came the '•'' partly broken " state. She was strong in her first 
part, imperial, absolute, unbroken. This is signified by the iron legs of the 
image, and the corporate strength of the fourth beast of Daniel's vision. But 
in her later stages, she has entered the phase represented by the clay-and-iron 
mixed ten-toed feet of the image, and by the antagonistic horns on the head of 
the fourth beast. She has been weakened by the introduction of regal rivalries 
and democratic reactions ; and we now behold her cut up into ten distinct and 
independent sections. Her old imperial strength has gone. She no longer 
rules the world. She no longer curses mankind with the most formidable of 
tyrannies. She is broken, divided, weakened ; a rickety, disjointed system of 
nations, which hardly holds together for very weakness ; a mixture of iron and 
clay of brittle cohesion, destined ere long to be smashed to atoms by the 
invincible stone from heaven. She has never been superseded. She has been 
changed by many vicissitudes. Still she lingers in weakness. The present 
political arrangements on the continent of Europe are but a prolongation of her 
existence in another form, corresponding to the requirements of the vision. 
They exhibit to us the last stage of the fourth kingdom, and tell us that we 
approach the time when a change will come over the world — when the fifth 
kingdom shall be manifested in destructive antagonism to all human power. 

This suggests the consummation to which we must now direct our attention. 
We have seen the exactness with which this divine prophetic revelation has 
been verified in history, so far as it has yet developed itself ; and herein we are 



191 

f umislied with a clue for tlie interpretation of the unfulfilled part of the vision. 
History has only brought us to the feet of the image, and the last of the four 
beasts ; that is, to the close of the fourth great dominion, which it was predicted 
should arise in the earth. But what lies beyond ? What may we next look for 
in the unfolding of this declared purpose of God ? Let any one having read 
thus far, sit down and peruse the 2nd and 7th chapters of Daniel attentively, 
and see if he do not, as a matter of self-evident testimony, come to the conclu- 
sion that the next step in the march of events is the visible interposition of 
divine power in human affairs. Consider the stone : it is hewn from its bed by 
miraculous agency; it appears on the scene after the image has attained 
complete development ; it descends upon the feet of the image with violence, 
and reduces the human-like structure to atoms which are taken away by the 
wind ; and then the stone expands into earth-occupying dimensions. Now, 
what is the interpretation of all this ? We could almost work the problem 
unaided, so unmistakable is the tendency of the symbolism. But let the plain 
language of divine explanation decide the point. — (Dan. ii. 44.) 

" In the days of these kings sliall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall 
never be destroyed ; and the kingdom shall not be left to other people ; hut it shall 
break in pieces and consume all other kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever." 

Can there be any difference of opinion as to the meaning of this language ? 
It is addressed to us as an interpretation : and to understand it in any mystical 
sense is to ignore the essential character of the statement, and arbitrarily violate 
the most obvious rule in the case. On no principle can an interpretation be 
converted into figurative discourse ; for its very nature, as such, compels us to 
recognise its statement in a plain and literal sense. This being so, the teaching 
of Daniel ii. 44, cannot be evaded. It declares the purpose of God to set aside 
the existing arrangement of things on the earth, and this not in an unseen, 
quiet, gradual manner, such as the predicted spread of a spiritual millennium ; 
but with the visibility, violent destructiveness, and suddenness of the stone's 
descent upon the image. The four kingdoms have destroyed each other ; but 
inasmuch as they were of the same (human) stock, they are not represented in 
the vision of the image as separate conflicting objects, but as part and parcel of 
the same body politic. Yet they violently and completely superseded each 
other, though no violence is signified in the symbol. The only violence repres- 
ented is in connection with the crisis that has not yet arrived. It is employed 
by the stone toward the image, as representing the entire system of human 
government. This would lead us to anticipate violence of an impreccdented 
kind, when the event signified comes to pass ; and the reader will see that the 
wording of the interpretation is strictly corroborative of this legitimate 
inference. " The God of heaven shaU . . break in pieces and cojisumo 



192 



1 



. 11 these kingaoms." Herein is predicted the entire disruption of all systems 
)1' human government, the complete and violent suppression of " the powers 
i Lat be." This is not a " notion " or a " crotchet " founded upon an ambiguous 
.s}'mbol, but a simple reiteration of the unmistakable language of inspired 
luterpretation. The same purpose is distinctly intimated in other parts of 
]-)rophetic writ. For instance, in Psalm ii. Christ is addressed in the following 
iuuguiige (verses 8-9): — 

"Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the 
uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession. Thou shalt break thevi with a rod of 
iron, and thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel." 

Again, Psalm ex. 5, 6, where it is also the subject of inspired song : — 

" The Lord at thy right hand shall strike through kings in the day of His wrath. . 
. He shall wound the heads over many countries.^' 

Again, Isaiah, pcurtraying this sa.me divine interference, says (chaj). xxiv. 
21-23):— 

" It shall come to pass in that day that the Lord shall punish the hosts of the high 
ones that are on high, and the kings of the earth that are upon the earth. They shall be 
gathered together as prisoners are gathered into the pit, and shall be shut up in the 
prison, and after many days they shall be visited {marginal reading ' found wanting'). 
THEN shall the moon be confounded, and the sun ashamed, when the Lord of Hosts 
shall reign in Mount Zion and in Jerusalem, before his ancients gloriously." 

Again, Harnah uses the following words in her song, on the occasion of 
Samuel's birtli. — (1 Sam. ii. 10): — 

" The adversaries of the Lord shall he broken to pieces ; out of heaven shall He thunder^ 
upon them. The Lord shall judge the ends of the earth, and he shall give strength to 
His king, and exalt the horn of His anointed (or Christ)." 

Again, (Haggai ii. 21, 22): — 

" I will shake the heavens and the earth, and Iioill overthrow the throne of kingdoms, 
and I will destroy the strength of the kingdoms of tlie heathen." 

There are many other statements of a similar import throughout the 
Bcriptures ; but these are sufficient to show that the teaching in the book of 
Daniel is not isolated or exceptional, but co-incident with the general tone of 
prophetic testimony. That testimony destroys the popular idea of a millennium 
to be brought about by evangelical enterprise. It precludes the theory of 
gradual enlightenment and amelioration by hrnnan agency. It shows that all 
Gxpectations of a day of perfection, consequent upon the ultimate triumph of 
C;:ristianity in the world, are visionary as a dream, destined to receive effectual 
cii.s.^dpation in the awful judgments by which the powers of the world will be 
hi r-rn of authority, and mankind brought to their senses. 

Eeturning to Daniel, we find that there is not only a work of demolition, but 
one of apbuilding and restitution. This is the Incst glorious feature of the 



L 



193 

divine purpose ; " the God of heaven shall set %ip a kingdom wMcJi shall never 
he destroyed^ and the kingdom shall not be left to other people . . but 

it shall stand for ever." Now let tis consider, for a moment, what the setting- 
up of a kingdom means, and we shall understand this statement better, A 
kingdom is not an abstraction. It is not any single thing ; it is an aggregation 
of certain elements which go to make it up. A king in himself is not a kingdom ; 
neither is a country, or a people, or laws, separately; it requires them all 
combined to constitute a kingdom. This must commend itself to every man's 
judgment. A kingdom consists of, 1st, a king; 2nd, an aristocracy; Srd, a 
people ; 4th, a territory ; and 5th, laws. Now to set up a kingdom, is obviously 
to arrange and combine these elements. To appoint a king, is not to set up a 
kingdom : David was anointed years before he ascended the throne ; but the 
kingdom of David was not established until David actually became king over 
the realm. To portion out a territory, is not to set up a kingdom : a land 
without a king or inhabitants is no kingdom. To set up a kingdom, is to put 
together the various parts that make one. Now, in the testimony before us, we 
have it declared that it is the purpose of the Almighty to do this very thing — 
to orgardse a kingdom of His own in place of those which now occupy the 
earth, after they shall have been svvrept out of the way. Hence, we are led to 
expect, as the inevitable result of testimony believed, that when the fourth 
kingdom now existing shall have been abolished of God, a new order of things 
shall visibly arise in the earth, in which there shall be a God-appointed king, 
a God-constituted aristocracy, a God- selected people, a God-chosen land, and 
God-given laws — altogether constituting a kingdom of God on the earth. 
Accordingly we find that each of these elements is separately provided for iii 
the course of the prophecy. On the subject of the king, vv^e need not go out of 
Daniel, chap. vii. 13, 14 — 

" I saw, in the night, visions, and heholcl, one Wke the son of Man came with the 
(Jloucls of heaven . . and there was given him dominion, and glory, and i\ 

kingdom, that all jjcople, nations, and languages should serve him. His dominion is an 
everlasting dominion, which shall no. pasa away, and his kingdom, thai which shall 
not be destroyed." 

Here we have an explanation of chap. ii. 44. But the main point to be noted 
is, that Daniel supplies us with the first element of the Idngdom, viz., the king, 
styled in chapter ix. 25, " Messiah the Prince." This is Jesus Christ, spoken of 
in Revelations xix. 16, as the "I^ng of kings, and Lord of lords." This is a 
subject capable of much enlargement; but as a whole lectiu-e will be devoted 
to it, we at present desist. 

Daniel also supplies us with the aristocracy of the coming Idngdom. Wo 
find them in the following verse from chapter vii : 



194 

"The kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom nnder the 
whole heaven, shall be given tc the people of the saints of the Most High." — l Versa 27.) 

These are referred tc by Peter, (1 Peter ii. 9,) as "a chosen generation, a 
royal priesthood^ a holy nation, a peculiar people; " and in E-evelations v. 10, 
they are prospectively represented as singing " Thou hast made us unto our 
God kings and priests, and we shall reign on the earths In these, we recognize 
Christians who are faithful to the end, and coionted worthy to inherit the 
kingdom of God. Thus the aristocracy of the future age are neither more nor 
less than the poor men and women of this and all past ages, who do the wiU of 
God and hope for His salvation. They are "taken out from among the Gentiles 
as a people for His name." They are " called to His kingdom and glory," and 
*' their citizenship is " therefore " in heaven." They have here " no continuing 
city : they seek one to come." They are not known or recognised by the world. 
They walk in obscurity ; they are among the humble of the earth, they are 
without name, standing, or wealth, but they are nevertheless the greatest among 
the sons of men. They are destined to be the rulers in a perfect age that shall 
be without end, the possessors of all the wealth that great men are now piling 
up with such diligence. They are monarchs of more illustrious degree than 
any of "the rulers of the darkness of this aion (age)." The time hastens when 
the Almighty will " put down the mighty from their seats, and exalt them of 
low degree.'' What a privilege to be among the latter, even if it do involve 
present obscurity and defame ! 

The people who shall constitute the subjects of the kingdom, are also plainly 
indicated. Those are the Jews to whom Moses said (Deut. vii. 6) — 

" The Lord thy God hath chosen thee to hs a special people unto Himself , above all 
peoxjle that are upon the face of the earth.^^ 

The Jews are now in a scattered and degraded condition ; but they are to be 
gathered from their dispersion, and reinstated in their land, as a great nation, 
there to constitute the subject-people of the Messiah when he returns. This 
is a subject by itself, and wiU be treated in a separate lecture. Meanwhile, it 
is necessary to make this passing mention of the subject, in order to complete the 
picture of the kingdom of God. It is necessary to add, in order to prevent 
misconception, that the subject -inhabit ants of the earth in the future age are 
not restricted to the Jews. They also comprise " aU peoples, and nations, and 
languages." Yet there is a distinction to be marked. " The kingdom of God " 
is distiuct from the "all peoples, nations, and languages," which it rules; just 
as the kingdom of Great Britain is distinct from Canada, New Zealand, and her 
other colonies. The Jews will be to the kingdom of God what Englishmen 
are to England, and other nations will form so many dependencies subject to^ 



195 

but not constituting, the kingdom of God, so that while all are the subjects of 
the kingdom, yet the Jews are so in a proper and exclusive sense. Hence we 
read, Zech. viii. 23 — 

"In those days it shall come to pass that ten men Bhall take hold out of all 
languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, 
saying we wiU go with you, for we have heard that God i& icith youJ' 

And again, Micah iv. 8— 

" And thou, O tower of the flock, the stronghold jf the daughter of Zion, unto thee 
shall it come, even the first dominion, the kingdom shall come to the daughter of 
Jerusalem,'' 

But all this will be made more apparent in the tenth lecture. 

The fourth element of the kingdom — the land — ^is also frequently mentioned 
in the Scriptures, and often in such away as directly to identify it with God's 
future purpose. It is repeatedly spoken of as ^' my land." For illustration of 
this, the reader is referred to Ezekiel xxxviii. 16 ; xxxvi. 5 ; Jeremiah xvi. 18 ; 
ii. 7; Isaiah xiv. 25, &c. Moses says of it (Deut. xi. 12), "It is a land 
which the Lord thy God careth for; the eyes of the Lord thy God are always 
upon it, from the beginning of the year even unto the end of the year." This was 
Palestine, " that Heth between the river of Egypt and the great river Euphrates" 
— the land promised as a personal everlasting possession to Abraham, Isaac, 
and Jacob. — (Genesis xiii. 14; xxvi. 3 ; xxviii. 13.) The Jews occupied 
it under divine covenant for many centuries, but were ultimately expelled 
from it in shame, because they defiled it. At present the land is desolate, and 
desecrated by every species of Gentile abomination ; but we are told of a time 
(Deut. xxxii. 43) when God " will be merciful unto his land and to his 
people." Of that time it is written, (Zee. ii. 12.) 

" The Lord shall inherit Judah, His portion in the Holi} Land, and shall choose 
Jerusalem again.*' 

Again, (Ezekiel xxxvi. 33, 35.) 

*' Thus saith the Lord God, in the day that I have cleansed you from all your 
iniquity, I will also cause you to dwell in the cities; and the wastes shall be huilded^ 
and the desolate land shall be tilled, whereas it lay desolate in the sight of all that 
passed by. And they shall say, This Land that was desolate is becojie like 
a?HE Garden of Eden ; and the waste, and desolate, and ruined cities are become 
fenced, and are inhabited." 

As to the laws, it is written in Isaiah ii. 3, 4 — 

"And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of 
tlie Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob ; and he ivill teach us of his ways, and wo 
will walk in His paths; for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word 
OF THE Lord from Jerusalem, And He shall judge among the nations, and shall 



196 



iii * 



rebuke many people; and they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their 
spears into pruning-hooks. Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither 
shall they Icaru war any more." 

Here then is a summary of Scripture testimony, in wbicli the five 
constituent elements of the kingdom of God are made clearly manifest. It is 
needless to say that tliis kingdom is not yet in existence : such a proposition is 
self-evident. Its existence does not commence till human government is 
entirely abolished. Not until the great image — now standing upon its ten-toed 
feet in Europe — is broken to pieces, and "driven away like the chaff of a 
summer threshing-floor," shall the stone expand to the filling of the whole 
earth. That stone has not yet descended ; Jesus Christ has not yet returned 
from the far country whither he is gone, to receive for himself a kingdom. — 
(Luke xix. 12, 27.) Ke is waiting for the appointed time. YvTien that arrives, 
he will be made manifest as "the stone which the builders rejected, become 
the head of the corner ; on whomsoever it shall fall it will grind him to 
powder." He will go forth "to make war against the kings of the earth and 
their armies," (Eev. xix. 11, 20) and having overcome them, '^the MngdoTns 
of this icorld shall Income the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ. — 
(Rev. xi. 15.) 

Then Tvill commence a glorious reign, outdistancing, by infinitude, the most 
perfect government that has ever existed on earth. One king shall be at the 
head, whose wisdom shall be equal to all the exigencies of universal dominion, 
whose mercy shall be untainted by selfishness and uncharacterised by 
weakness, and whose power shall be omnipotent for the enforcement of his 
will. He \\i.ll be perfection — ^free from blemish or frailty — and far beyond 
the fear of death. His government will be firm, direct, and absolute — no 
vacillation — no circumlocution — no doubtfulness and indecision. " The spirit 
of the Lord shall rest upon him ; the spirit of wisdom and understanding -, 
the spiiit of counsel and might ; the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the 
Lord; and shall make him of quick imderstanding in the fear of the 
Lord. iVnd he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove 
after the hearing of his ears; but with righteousness shall he judge the poor, 
and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth. And he shall smite the earth 
with the rod of liis mouth, and with the breath of his iij)s shall he slay the 
wicked." — (Isaiah xi. 2-4.) Then will be exemplified the theory of perfect 
government, which it is possible now to conceive, but not to realize. Absolute 
authority, backed by omnipotence, will rule mankind with simpHcity a,nd 
\igour. PJghteous law, emanating from its legitimate Source, will be 
enforced with resistless authority. Innocence ^-ill be protected, poverty 
shielded, rapacity restrained, arrogance brought down, and the rights of aU 



197 

jsecured in the minutest matter. The king's government will be administered 
by the king's associates, the immortal, incorruptible, perfected brethren of the 
Lord Jesus Christ, who, having undergone previous moral qualification, will 
have been fashioned like unto the glorious body of their Lord and Master. The 
power will be permanently in their hands, not by popular suffrage, but by 
royal commission of the true type. The power of the people will be a myth in ] 
those days. All assertion of political birthright will be suppressed. An iroa 
administration, with superhuman povv^ers at their command, will vigorously 
put dovtTi rebellion of every form, and maintain the only government that will 
have blessed the world with peace and righteousness in the name of divine 
right. Then shall the glory of the Lord cover the earth as the waters cover 
the sea. Then shall be fulfilled the words of the angels : " Glory to God in 
the highest, peace upon earth, and goodwill towards men." 

Now, we made it evident to start with, that this glorious purpose was 
announced in the gospel preached by Jesus and his apostles ; it was proclaimed 
for belief. "Go," said Jesus, "into all the world, and preach the gospel to 
every creature. He that delieveth, and is baptized, shall be saved." Thus 
belief was made the first condition of salvation, that is, belief in the things set 
forth in the proclamation to which the commission had reference. These things 
comprised the doctrine of the kingdom. Hence, no man believes the gospel 
who is ignorant of the prophetic disclosures concerning the kingdom of God. 
Ee it observed, that not only is it the fact that Paul preached the kingdom of 
God, but he preached it out of the projjliets. Peooe : 

" He expounded and testified the kingdom of Grod, persuading them concerning 
Jesus, both out of the law of Moses and out of the psophets." — Acts xxviii. 23. 

" I continue unto this day, witnessing both to small and great, saying none other 
things than those which the peophets and Moses did say should come." — Acts xxri. 22, 

" So worship I (Paul) the God of my fathers, believing all things which rre 
written in the law and in the prophets.''— Acts xxiv. 14. 

"Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three Sabbath days reasoned with 
them out of the Scriptures." — Acts xvii. 2. (There were no other Scriptures at 
the lime than the Old Testament.) 

Previous to the death of Christ, the crucifixion formed no part of the gospel. 
Subsequently, however, it came to be preached as a supplement to the things 
concerning the kingdom of God. This appears from the distinction observed 
in the phrases by wdiich the preaching of the apostles is designated at these 
two different periods. In the gospel narratives, the proclamation is described 
as simply relating to "the kingdom of God;" whereas, in the Acts of the 
Apostles, the phrase runs, " the things concerning the Idngdom of God, AND 



198 

the name of Jesus Christ." Now, the things concerning the name of Christ 
comprehend the doctrinal teaching as to how the sons of Adam might put on 
that "only one name which is given under heaven, whereby men may be 
saved." This involved the teaching concerning Christ's sacrifice; for had he 
not died for our sins, and " risen again for our justification," it would have been 
impossible for us to have "put on his name," since his name would not other- 
wise have been provided. This element of "the mystery of godliness," then, 
was superadded to the things concerning the kingdom of God, in order to make 
the other of practical value. The glad tidings of the kingdom would have been 
no gospel to us, unless a way had been opened up for our personal participation 
in the glorj to be revealed. This way was opened in the death and resurrection 
of Christ : and the announcement of this fact, with explanation as to the modus 
op era 71 di in which we might enter this "way," naturally became a constituent 
part of the glad tidings. One part was incomplete without the other. The 
only difference between the gospel preached by Christ before his death, and that 
proclaimed after his ascension, was that the latter comprehended the teaching 
concerning the name of Christ, in addition to the subject matter of the other. 
There was no alteration; there was simply addition. The kingdom was 
presented for beUef and hope ; the sacrifice, for faith with a view to the hope. 
Both went together. They were never disjoined. United, they constituted 
the one gospel preached to the world by the apostles of Christ, as the means of 
human salvation. Disjoined, each is inefficacious to enlighten any man unto 
salvation. 

Now, it is a remarkable fact that, in this nineteenth century of boasted 
Christian knowledge, we hear nothing at all, in pulpit preaching, about the first 
and main element of the gospel — the kingdom of God. If it is spoken about at 
all, it is vrith a significance totally different from that which it possesses in the 
Scriptures. As used by the commonalty of religious people, it means different 
things in different mouths, but never refers to that glorious manifestation of 
divine power on earth, which is destined shortly to upset the whole system of 
human misgovemment, and establish a glorious kingdom in the earth, in which 
God will be honoured and man happy. Furthermore, with whatever meaning 
the phrase may be used, the kingdom of God is never spoken of to the people or 
preached about as in any way forming a part of the good message from heaven, 
which men must believe unto salvation. Thus there has been a great departure 
from the original example. As the Jews of ancient times would only receive the 
doctrine of the kingdom, and that in a carnal and corrupted form, so the 
Gentiles of modem times, full of boast and confidence, will only hear of a 
suffering Messiah whom they contemplate with perverted gaze. Thus we have 
two extremes — equally far from the truth. The Bible lies between them : and 



199 

before any of them can be in a safe position, they must meet in the blending of 
"the things concerning the kingdom of God, AND the name of Jesus Christ." 
At present there is a great and vital lack in popular preaching. The people 
are led to hope for translation to heaven at death as the great object of a 
religious life, and as the great burden of the promises of God, when, indeed, such 
a hope is utterly delusive, having no place at all in the Scriptures ; while, on 
the other hand, the glorious gospel of the blessed God is hid from their eyes. 
Thus do the leaders of the people cause them to err. The bhnd leading the 
blind shall certainly fall into the ditch. 

If we look into the practical teaching of the New Testament, we shaU find 
that it is thoroughly interlaced with the doctrine of the kingdom of God. We 
begin with the exhortation of the great Master himself — " Seek ye first the 
KENGDOM OF GoD and His righteousness." — (Matt. vi. 33.) Here are plain 
words. "We hear nothing like them in the religious teaching of this age ; no 
such counsel ever falls from the lips of clergy or ministers. With aU their zeal 
for the dissemination of the truth of Christ in the world, they actually neglect 
the inculcation of its first principle as expressed in the words befoire us. They 
never tell men to " seek first the kingdom of God ; " they don't even tell them 
that such a thing is coming. The fact is, they are ignorant on the subject 
themselves ; for surely, otherwise, they would speak of it. They exhort their 
hearers to seek "mansions in the skies," to "prepare for death," to "fit 
themselves for heaven," and save their immortal souls from the torments of 
hell ; thus proclaiming fictitious doctrine, while in all their preachings they 
make no mention of the great central prospective truth relating to the Idngdom 
of God. They thus disprove themselves to be the ministers of truth and light. 
Christ not only warned men to " seek first the kingdom of God," but he taught 
his disciples to pray for its coming, saying " Thy kingdom come : thy will ho 
done on earth as it is in heaven^ No prayer like this ascends from the 
pulpits of our churches and chapels. It is true that in the churches, the "Lord's 
Prayer" is repeated as a form of devotional exercise ; but when the occupants 
of the pulpit are left to frame their own petitions, they breathe no requests that 
the kingdom of God may come. True, they pray for " the extension of the 
Redeemer's kingdom ;" but by this they mean " the propagation of the vlsihle 
church,'' which is a very different thing from the establishment of the 
Almighty's (not now existing) divine kingdom on earth, for the glorification of 
His own great name, and the blessing of humanity. Such a prayer is, in fact, 
a tacit declaration of unbelief in the coming kingdom of God's revealed purpose, 
because it assumes that kingdom to be already in existence ; and, ignoring His 
future plans, asserts a system to be the kingdom of God, which is only tlio 
ecclesiastical embodiment of error and oi^position to His truth. Verily, the 



900 

teachers require to be taught the fii-st principles of the oracles of 
God!" 

Christ has said " Whosoeve?' shall not receive the hitigdom of God as a little 
child y shall in no wise enter therein.'' — (Luke xviii. 17.) This is a solemn 
statement, deserving, nay, demanding, most attentive consideration. It is a 
certain decree of exclusion against all who do not humbly and joyfully believe 
in the glad tidings concerning the kingdom of God. It is fatal to the sceptic, 
whatever be his excellence of character. It shuts out the man who is so en- 
grossed in the business and pleasiu'es of tliis life, as to be indifferent about thi 
future, blindly trusting that all will be right if he pay 20s. in the pound. I1 
debars the pseudo-liberal man of the nineteenth century, who, in the supreme 
wisdom of a scientific cramming, talks contemptuously about "theology." But 
it is equally fatal to another class, who tliink they have nothing to fear. What 
does the professing orthodox Christian say to it ? How stand the Churchman, 
the Indei)endent, the Baptist, the ]\Iethodist, related to this principle ? What 
say they to the kingdom of God ? Do they receive it as a little child r Let 
them be told about the purpose of God to send Jesus Christ to earth again 
(Acts iii. 20), to raise again the tabernacle of David that is fallen do"\ATi, and to 
baild it as in the days of old (Amos ix. 11) ; to pull down the mighty from their 
se-ats, and exalt them of low degi'ee (Luke i. 52) ; to humble all the kings of the 
earth, and compel the homage of their peoples (Isaiah xxiv. 21; Psalm IxxiL 
S-11 ; Dan. vii. 14 ; Psalm ii. 9) ; to estabhsh hun in the city of Jerusalem, as 
universal king on earth (Isaiah xxiv. 23; Jeremiah ui. 17; Micah iv. 2 — 7); to 
give power to his accepted people, as de facto co-rulers with him of the 
nations of the earth (Eev. ii. 26, 27 ; Rev. v. 9, 10 ; Psahn cxlix. o, 9 ; Daa. 
vii. 27). Let them be told of the mission of Jesus Christ to raise up the tribes 
of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel (Isaiah xlix. 6) ; to gather 
again the childi-en of Israel from all nations among whom they are scattered, 
and to bring them to the land of theii* fathers, now waste and desolate (Ezek. 
xxxvii. 21, 22); and there to constitute them a glorious nation, served and 
honoured by aU, even as they are now opx3ressed and despised (Zeph. iii. 19, 
20 ; Isaiah Ixi. o, 7 ; Isaiah Ix. 10, 14). Let them be told of aU these things, 
which are plainly written in the word of truth, and what will they say ? What 
<:^o they say? Do they receive them as a little child? Do they not rather 
reject them with scorn, and throw all the ridicule which their mouths can 
frame upon those who dii'cct their attention to these things ? Let them beware 
lest they come into condemnation, and realize the words addressed by Jesus to 
the Pharisees : "Te shall see Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and all the prophets 
in the kingdom of God ; and many shall come from the east and the west, and the 
north and the south, and shall sit down la the kingdom of God, hut ye your* 



I 



201 

selves shall he thrust out.''' Wiser far will it be to receive the kingdom of God 
with the meekness and gratitude of a little child, that at the end of the days, 
they may hear the words of welcome addressed to them, " Come, ye blessed of 
my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of tlio 
world." 

We read in Acts i. 3, that Jesus was seen of his disciples forty days after hh^ 
passion, speaking unto them the things peetaining to the kingdom of God. 
Here is an example for our religious teachers. The Great Master considered 
the things of the kingdom of so much importance, that he devoted his last days 
on earth to their exposition. How much then does it behove those who 
profess to be his ministers to instruct the people therein ; yet how wofully do 
they come behind in their self-imposed duty ! 

In Matthew vii. 21, we find the following words : " Not every one that saith 
Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven ; but he that doeth the will 
of my Father who is in heaven." Wordy profession will not avail anything in 
securing an entrance into the kingdom of God. A mere assent to Christian, 
doctrine — an intellectual recognition of gospel truth — will not qualify a man for 
that high honour. ^6^Z^/mustb8 accompanied by a hearty performance of 
the wiU of God, as made known in the preceptive department of the truth ; and 
this is what few men are equal to. The moral courage that is not frightened 
at singularity is a scarce thing, especially in matters of principle. Men will 
rather wink at tricks in trade, and conform to dishonourable practices without 
end, than boldly avow conscientious conviction, and be considered "soft." 
Fashion, reputation, and other influences at work in society, briefly summarised 
by the apostle John, as "the lust of the eye, the lust of the flesh, and the pride 
of life," are too powerful with the common run of mortals, to allow of many 
entering the kingdom of God. " The unrighteous shall not inherit the king- 
dom of God." — (1 Cor. vi. 9.) Straight is the gate, and narrow is the way, 
and few there be that fuid it." Again, in Mark x. 24, we read " How hard is 
it for them that trust in riches to enter into the kingdom of God." James 
presents the other side of the picture in chapter ii. 5 : "Hearken, my beloved 
brethren, hath not God chosen the j^oor of this ovorld^ rich in faith, and heirs 
of the kingdom which He hath promised to them that love Him ?" Riches 
come not alone to a man. They surround him with circumstances which are 
unfavourable to spiritual perception. For this reason a rich man has very 
little chance of ever becoming an heir of the kingdom of God ; not from the 
simple circumstance of his happening to have riches, but because he becomes 
subject, through them, to many influences of an unfavourable character. It is 
different with the poor. They may take comfort. To them pre-eminently 
the gospel is preached ; and to thorn it cannot fail to prescjit many more 



202 

attractions than to the rich man, because in this life they have little to comfort 
them. Their days are spent in grinding labour. They manage with difficulty 
to "provide things honest in the sight of all men," and are strangers to thi 
elegancies and luxuries by which the rich sweeten their lives. They are heL 
in small reputation, have few friends and few pleasures. To them the gospel 
is glad tidings indeed : it promises them deliverance from all the imperfections 
and drawbacks of the present life, and possession of riches and honour in the 
kingdom of God — far greater and more enduring, and certainly not less real 
than those which are now inherited by the great men of the earth ; and in the 
affectionate belief of tliis promise, and the moral elevation and spiritual 
improvement which the contemplation thereof induces, he is blessed with the 
peace of God that passeth all understanding — a peace that the world knoweth 
not of — a peace that the world cannot give, and cannot take away. 

From what has been advanced, it will be manifest that the kingdom of God 
was a main element of the gospel, which regulated the actions, and inspired 
the hopes of the Christians of early times. The great religious systems of the 
day are entirely destitute of that element ; and yet are confidently trusting to, 
their sufficiency for the salvation of men. WTiat an alarming fact ! Th( 
gospel of Jesus Christ, as made known in the New Testament, is not preached 
in our churches and chapels. To account for such a state of things, it would 
be necessary to say more than the limits of this lecture will allow ; but there is 
a certain prediction of Paul's which may throw some light on the subject. It 
will be found in 2 Tim. iv. 3, 4 — 

" The time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but after their own 
lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, [they] having itching ears ; and they 

SHALL TURN AWAY THEIR EARS FROM THE TRUTH, AND SHALL BE TURNED UNTO 
FABLES." 

This prediction requires no comment. We observe its fulfilment in the 
present state of Christendom, and the warning voice to every earnest mind is, 
in the words of Peter, "Save yourselves from this untoward generation." 
Like the Christians of old, ^'Gladhj receive the word and he 'baiJtiscd.'" Stead- 
fastly continue in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of 
bread and in prayers : and when the time appointed arrives, " an entrance 
shall be administered unto you- abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our 
Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." — (2 Peter i. 11.) 



1 



4 



203 



LEG TUEE VI. (a.) 



TEE PROMISES MADE TO THE FATHERS (ABRAHAM, ISAAC, 

AND JACOB J YET TO BE FUIFIIIED IN THE SETTING VP 

OF THE KINGDOM OF GOD ON THE EARTH. 

No attentive reader of the New Testament can be ignorant of the prominence 
given in the apostolic writings to "the peo]!OSES made unto the fathers ; " 
he may not understand what is meant by the phrase, but he can scarcely avoid 
acquaintance with the phrase itself, as a thing of importance, because it is used 
in such a way as to show that whatever it refers to, it expresses something that 
has a fundamental relation to the scheme of truth apostolically delivered. 

Those who are not New Testament readers, nor Old Testament readers either, 
will know nothing about it. For their benefit and the general elucidation of 
the subject, we call attention to the state of the matter, by quoting Paul's 
statement that "Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of 
God, to confirm the peomises made unto tlie father 8.'' (Eom. xv. 8.) This at 
once brings the subject to a point, declaring a connection between the mission of 
Christ and that which is styled "the promises ; " and thereby imposing upon 
us the necessity of recognising the importance of the item and branch of truth 
so expressed, instead of turning- away from the subject with indifference, as is 
the custom with the majority of religious people, not excepting those professing 
to be New Testament Christians, If Christ came to " confirm the promises 
made unto the fathers," it is obviously of the first importance that we know 
something about these promises, and we need have no difficulty in getting the 
knowledge desired. Paul incidentally declares that whatever they are, the 
promises belong to the Jews. 

" My kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites, to whom pertaineth the 
adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service 
of God, AND THE PEOMISES." — Rom. ix. 3-4. 

Speaking more definitely on the subject, he says 

" Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not. And to seeds as 
of many, but as of one, and to thy seed, which is Christ . . . And if ye be Christ's, 
then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise."— Gal. iii. 16, 29. 

From this, it is evident that if we would know something about " the 
promises " which Paul had in his eye, we must refer to the history of Abraham, 
irom which he derived his information. With this history most people are 



204 

familiar ; but as a rule, they are ignorant of anything in connection with it 
which answers to Paul's words in Gal. iii. 16, 29. They know that Abraham 
emigrated from Chaldea, by divine command, became a settler in Canaan, and 
that God promised to greatly multiply his posterity, and make them a great 
nation in the country where he was then a stranger ; they believe that it was 
promised to him that Christ, the Saviour of the world, should come in his line, 
and that in this way, through the preaching of the gospel, all nations should 
ultimately be blessed through him ; but they have no idea of any promises 
which form the groundwork of the Christian faith, or the subject-matter of the 
gospel. They admit there were promises, but, practically, they consider them 
past and done with. They consider them as applicable only to the now 
insignificant events of Jewish history. They certainly have no idea of any 
" promises made unto the fathers," in which they can hope to have any personal 
interest, or from which, indeed, Abraham himself can have any future benefit. 
They have no idea of themselves or any other body ^' inheriting the promises" 
made 3,000 years ago to the fathers. The promises, in their estimation, are an 
affair of the past, a part of the first dispensation, which, having waxed old, has 
vanished away. The thing to be looked for from their point of view, is the 
thing that, in their opinion, has happened to the fathers themselves and to all 
righteous men ever since, — an event before which all parties are on a dead 
level, premises or no promises ; and that is, going to heaven when death comes, 
if righteous. They sing and teach their children to sing — 

Where is now the prophet Daniel ? 
Safe in the PEo:!iiiSED land. 

In their estimation, the promised land is heaven ; thither they sing of all the 
faithful having gone — their "souls" having, according to their creed, 
" dr-narted to glory," when death laid their bodies low. They consider that 
the promises made to them have been amply realized. It \^ evident there is a 
great mistake in this. Paul says — 

" These all died in faith, not hating eeceiyed the PRo:m:eES, but having seen them 
A^AB OFF, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they 
\%-ere strangers and pilgrims on the earth."— Heb. xi. 13-85, 39, 40, 

This affirms that the fathers died without receiving what had been promised ; 
in direct opposition to orthodoxy, which says they died and thus received the 
pi-omises, being one and all "safe in the promised land." Paul repeats the 
statement at the end of the chapter. He says — 

" These all having obtained a good report through faith, received not tJie promise, Gcd 
having provided some better thing for us, that they icWiout us should not be made 
pebfect."— Heb. xi. 39, 40. 



205 

What were the promises made to the fathers, the substance of which they 
did not receive, and which Paul here declares they will not receive until the 
totality of the chosen ones *'from every nation, kindred, people, and tongue" is 
completed ? In answer to this, we affirm that they relate to matters forming 
the very essence and foundation of the salvation offered through Christ. "We 
do so on the strength of the following testimonies to begin with— 

"And now I ('Paul) stand (before Agrippa's judgment-seat) and am judged for the 

hope of THE PROMISE MADE OP GOD UNTO OUR FATHERS." — ActS XXvL 6. 

" He hath shewed strength with his arm ; he hath scattered the proud in the 
imagination of their hearts. He hath put down the mighty from their seats, and 
exalted them of low degree. He hath filled the hungry with good things, and the 
rich he hath sent empty away. He hath holpen his servant Israel, in remembrance 
of His mercy, as He spake to our fathers, to Abraham, and to his seed for ever." — 
Luke i. 51-55. 

" Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; for He hath visited and redeemed His people, 
and hath raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of His servant David 
(that is, Jesus — see context) ; as He spake by the mouth of His holy prophets, which 
have been since the world began; that we should be saved from our enemies, 
and from the hand of all that hate us ; to perform the mercy promised to our fathers, 
and to remember his holy covenant, the oath which he sware to our father 
Abrahajvi."— Luke i. 68-73. 

" Thou wilt perform the Truth to Jacob, and the Mercy to Abraham, 
WHICH THOU HAST SWORN UNTO OUR FATHERS FROM THE DAYS OP 
OLD."— Micah vii. 20. 

These passages support our affirmation. They show that the promises 
made to the fathers were unfulfilled at so recent a date as the first century — 
that is, near I?/ two thousand year's after they were made — and, further, that 
they have reference to the things to be accomplished, through Christ, instead 
of having, as the generality of religious people suppose, been fulfilled in 
Jewish history. 

But, for the better discussion of the question, and to come closer to the 
subject, let us look at the promises themselves. In seeking for them, we act 
under the guidance of Paul, who says, " To Abraham and his seed were the 
promises made." This is an infallible clue : we go to the history of Abraham, 
and find the following promises recorded : 

"Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy 
kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will show thee. And I will 
make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great ; and ■ 
thou shalt be a blessing. And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that 
curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed."— Gen. 
xii. 1-3. 

"And the Lord said unto Abraham, after that Lot was separated from him, Lift up 
now thine eyes and look from the place where thou art, northward, and southward, 
and ejistward, and westward ; For all the land which thou seestt to thee will J give it. 



^^^^^^^^^^^r 206 1 

and to thy seed {Chnfit)for ever. Arise, walk through the land in the length and in the 
breadth of it: for I will give it unto thee."— Gen. xiii. 14-17. See also xii. 7; 
XV. 8— 18; xvii. 8. 

"By myself have I sworn, saith the Lord; for because thou hast done this thing 
and hath not -vsithheld thy son, thine only son, that in blessing I will bless thee, and 
in multiplying, I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand 
•which is upon the sea shore, and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies. And 
IN THY SEED SHALL ALL THE NATIONS OF THE EARTH BE BLESSED, 
because thou hast obeyed ily voice." — Gen. xxii. 16 — 18. 

Paul styles Isaac and Jacob ''the heirs with him (Abraham) of the same I 

promise." — (Heb. xi. 9.) It will therefore lay the foundation more securely to 

quote the promises made to them, which it will be seen are, as Paul's words 

give us to ujiderstand, identical with those made to Abraham. 

"And the Lord appeared unto him (Isaac) and said . . . Sojourn in this land, 
and I will be with thee, arxd will bless thee ; for unto thee and unto thy seed I "WILL 
GlVEi ALL THESE COUNTRIES, and I will perform the oath which I sware unto 
Abraham thy father."— Gen. xxvi. 2, 3, 4. 

" And God Almighty bless thee (Jacob) , . . and give thee the blessing of 
Abraham, to thee and to thy seed with thee; that thou may est inherit the land 
wlierein thou art a stranger, which God gave unto Abraham." — Gen. xxviii. 3, 4' 

"I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, and the God of Isaac : THE LAND 
WHEREON THOU LIE ST, TO THEE WILL I GIVE IT, AND TO THY SEED, 
and in thee .... In thy seed shall all the families . of the eai-th be 
blessed." — Gen. xxviii. 13, 14. 

Kow, in analysing these "promises made to the fathers," it will be found that 
they consist of several distinct items, which it will be well to enumerate for 
the sake of clearness, and the consideration of each of which separately will 
enable us to see the truth of the proposition that stands as the subject of 
the lecture, viz., that these promises will only be fulfilled when Christ, having 
returned from heaven, and raised his people from the dead, reigns in Palestine 
as universal ruler, to whom all nations will bow in blessed allegiance. 

1st. — That Abraham' s posterity shonld become a great and mighty 7iativn. 
— This has not been fulfilled in the sense of the promise. It is true that 
Abraham's descendants, according to the flesh, have multiplied and filled a large 
place in history ; but this is not the only event contemplated in the promise, 
as is evident from Hom. ix. 6-8. The fieshly Jews from the day that they 
murmured against Moses and Aaron, in the wilderness, till now, when they 
reject the prophet like unto Moses, have ever been a stiff-necked, disobedient 
generation, walking after the ways of the heathen, and persecuting and 
slaying the servants of God sent to bring them to the right way. This is not 
the " great nation multiplied above the stars of heaven," that was promised 
to Abraham ; it were no blessing to surround a man with such a race of flesh- 
bom rebels. Paul says, " They are not all Israel which are of Israel, neitlier 



* 207 

heoause tliey are the seed of Abraham are they all children ; bnt in Isaac shall 
thy seed be called : that is, they which are the children of the flesh, these are 
not the children of God, but the childeen of the promise are counted eor 
THE SEED." — (Eom. ix. 6-8.) Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob pleased God by their 
faith and obedience ; those of their descendants who were not of this disposi- 
tion, were not of them, although they inherited their flesh and blood, and, 
therefore, were not "counted for the seed." They were not reckoned as 
constituents of the great nation promised to Abraham. The great majority of 
the Jews have been of this class, and are, therefore, rejected. Whence then 
comes the promised race of children? The principal part of them wlQ be 
furnished by the Jewish nation after the flesh ; for in aU their history, there 
has been a remnant that were truly Abrahamic, not only in blood, but in faith 
and obedience : these are "the children of the promise," and wiU be raised at 
the coming of Christ. The other part will come from the G-entiles, who, after 
ages of darkness, were visited in the apostolic era, with an invitation to 
become adopted into the stock of Abraham. This fact is made known in the 
following words — 

** God at the first did visit the Gentiles, to take out of them a 'people for His 
name." — Acts xv. 14. 

"By revelation, He made known unto me (Paul) the mystery . , 

which in other ages was not made known unto the sons of men . 
that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs, and of the same body, and partakers of His 
promise in Christ, by the gospel." — ^Eph. iii. 5, 6. 

" And he [Abraham] received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness 
of the faith which he had yet being uncircumcised,that he might be the father of all 
them that believe, though they be not circumcised; that righteousness might be imputed 
unto them also : and the father of circumcision to them who are not of the circumcision 
only, but who also WALK IN THE STEPS OF THAT FAITH OF OUR FATHER 
ABRAHAM, WHICH HE HAD, BEING YET UNCIRCUMCISED."— Eom. iv. 11, 12. 

Hence those who embrace the faith of Abraham, and become circumcised by 
putting on Christ in baptism, thus partaking imputatively of the literal circum- 
cision of which Christ was subject under the law, become the children of 
Abraham, and heirs of the promises made to him. This is Paul's testimony : 
" For as many of you as have been baptised into Cheist, have put on Christ. 
And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Ahraliam^s seed, and heirs 
ACCOEDING to THE PEOMiSE." — (Gal. iii. 27,29.) Of those in this position, Paul 
says, "Now, we brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise." — CGal. 
iv. 28.) 

This is the class contemplated in the promise made to Abraham ; but the 
point of time at which they are contemplated is not the present time, when 
they are a weak and scattered family, and the great bullv of them in the dust. 



208 

It is the time referred to in John xi. 52, when Christ will " gathe?' together m 

ONE the children of God that are scattered abroad," and in 2 Thess. ii. 1, *'the 

coming of our Lord Jesus and our gathering together unto himy Speaking 

of this time, Jesus says : 

"Maiuj shall come from the east andioest and shall sit down with Abraham, Isaac, 
and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven " — Matt. viii. 11. 

When this takes place, Abraham wiU behold the fulfilment of the promise 
that he should become a great and mighty nation, above the stars of heaven 
for multitude ; for his children of the royal order, raised from the dead of all 
ages, will be "a multitude that no man can number " (Eev. vii. 9), and his 
descendants according to the flesh, discixDlined and renovated as a nation, by 
trial in the wilderness a second time, will be the mightiest people on the globe, 
all righteous, and inheriting the land (Isaiah Ix. 21), and having "praise and 
fame in every land where they are now put to shame" — (Zeph. iii. 19).* This 
will be when the kingdom of God is established in the manner set forth in the 
last lecture. 

2nd. — That Abraham and his seed should receive possession of the land 
vndicated in the promise, viz,, **the i^kkd from the Oliver of Egypt unto the 
great river Euphrates,''' styled in the piromise of Abraham, -^tJie land' 
wherein thou art a st? anger y' — (Gen. xvii. 8.) This part of the promise is 
also unfulfilled. It requires but a feeble effort to see this. First, Moses records 
that Abraham had to buy a field of the original possessors of the country, 
wherein to bury his dead, and said to them, " I am a stranger and a sojourner 
with you.''' — (Gen. xxiii. 4.) Secondly, Paul says "^e sojourned in the land af 
promise as in a steanqe country." — (Heb. xi. 9.) Thirdly, Stephen says " God 
gave Mm none inheritance in it, no, not so wuck as to set his foot on, 
yet he promised that he would give it to him for a possession." — (Acts vii. 5.) 
If Abraham was a stranger and a sojourner in the land of promise, as in a 
strange country, and received none inheritance in it, not so much as a foot- 
breadth, surely so far as he is concerned, the premise is unfulfilled. If so, it 
remains to be fulfilled at a future time. '"Not so," says the orthodox 
objector : " the promise has been fulfilled in Abraham's descendants ; the Jews 
possessed the country for many centuries, and this was the fulfilment of the 
promise." The instant answer to this is found in Gal. iii. 16-18 : 

" Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to 
seeds, as of many, but as of one, and to thy seed which is Christ. And this I say, that 
the covenant that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law which was four 
hundred and thirty years after, cannot disannul, that it should make the promise of 
none effect. For if the inheritance be of the law, it is no more of promise ; BUT GOD 
GAVE IT TO ABRAHAM BY PROMISE." 

* As to this second aspect of the question, bearing upon the future of the Jews as 
a nation, the reader is referred to Lecture X. 



209 

" The promise tiiat he should be the heir of the world was not to Abraham, or to hig 
seed through the law, but through the righteousness of faith, /or if they which are of 
the law be heirs, faith is made void, and the PROMISE MADE OP NONE EFFECT."— 
Rom, iv.l3, 14 

"Now, let the reader observe that the Jews occupied the land tinder the law of 
Moses, which stipulated in the most stringent terms that their occupation 
should depend upon their conformity to its requirements. — (Deut. xxviii. 15-68.) 
Their inheritance of the country was altogether "of the law ;" it provided that 
if they kept the law, they should dwell in the land in prosperity; and that 
if they broke it, they should be dispersed among the nations in great suffering. 
History records how continually they failed in the matter, and how repeatedly 
they were subject to foreign yoke and captivity in consequence, and how at 
last, when hopeless rebellion had established itself in the whole house of Israel, 
culminating in the rejection of "the prophet like unto Moses," the Romans 
came and "took away their place and nation," scattering them in the wide 
dispersion of the present day. It is impossible in the face of these facts to 
maintain that the Jewish occupation of Palestine was a fulfilment of the 
promise made to Abraham ; for Paul says, in the words quoted, that the promise 
was not to Abraham or his seed through the law^ but through the righteousness 
of faith God gave it to Abraham by promise, free and unconditional. 
Therefore, says Paul, if they which are of the law be heirs, the promise is onade 
of none effect. — (Rom. iv. 14.) It foUows that the promise that Abraham and 
Christ should possess the land of Palestine is wholly unfulfilled, but will have its 
fulfilment when Abraham rises from the dead to enter the kingdom of God, 
then and there to be established. A consideration of what Paul says in Heb. 
xi. wiU show this : 

"By faith, Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place WHICH HE 
SHOULD AFTER RECEIVE FOR AN INHERITANCE, obeyed ; and he went out, 
not knowing whither he went. By faith, he sojourned in THE LAND OF PRO- 
MISE as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the 
heirs ivith him of the same promise. For he lggked for a city which hath foun- 
dations, WHOSE BUILDER AND MAKER IS GoD. . . These all died in faith, 
not having received the promises, hut having seen them afar of, and were persuaded 
of them and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims 
on the earth. For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a 
country. And truly if they had been mindful of the country from whence they 
came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned. £ut noiu they desire 
a better country, that is, a heavenly.^' — (verses 8-16). 

Let the reader carefully peruse and re-peruse this quotation from Hebrews, 
and having done so, let him realise its purport. Abraham, says Paul, was called 
to go into a country which he should afterwards receive for an inheritance. 
What country was this ? Let the reader consult Gen. xii. 4, 5, and he will have an 
answer : *' So Abraham departed as the Lord had spoken to him, and Lot went 



210 

with him. . . . and into the Land of Canaan they earned To make 
the matter certain beyond dispute, we will quote the words of Stephen: 

" Get thee CAbraliam) out of thy country and from thy kindred, and come 
into the land which I shall shew thee. i'hen came he out of the land of the 
Clialdcans, and dwelt in Charran, and from thence, when his father was dead, he 
removed him into THIS LAND WHEREIN YE NOW DWELL."— Acts vii. 3, 4. 

The land which Ab^ah^^m was " after to receive for an inheritance/*- was the 
land inhabited by the Jews in the days of the apostles, modem Syria, now a 
desolate province in the Turkish empire. He lived in it as a stranger, with 
Isaac and Jacob, to whom the promise of possession was afterwards renewed. 
This sojourn was the result of faith ; but for this, on finding as years rolled on, 
that he was not put in possession of the land, but left to wander without 
inhei'itance, he would have returned in disgust to his native country, and spent 
his days among his kindred. Paul says he and his sons "had opportunity to 
have returned ; " but they did not avail themselves of the opportunity, but 
steadfastly remained in the country to which they had been commanded to 
emigrate. Paul says the reason of this was, that they were " persuaded of the 
promises and embraced them." Notwithstanding that appearances were 
against them, they believed that God would in time fulfil His words, and give 
them the promised possession, and believing this, they were able to crucify the 
natural desire to go back to a country where they would have had both inherit- 
ance and friends, but in going back to which, they would have forfeited the 
promises. They saw that the thing promised was more worthy than " the 
country from whence they came out." They looked for a city (polity) which 
had foundations, and desired a heavenly country. The country from which 
they came out was without foundations ; based upon the flesh, which is of 
earth, earthy, it was ephemeral and passing away : as John says, " The world 
p asset h away and the lust thereof, but he that doeth the will of God, endureth 
for ever." — (1 Jno. ii. 17.) Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob saw in the promises 
the guarantee of a heavenly order of things, in which, God being the founder, 
there would be the stability of "foundations" that could never be removed; 
therefore, they consented to live strangers in a foreign land, waiting in faith 
for the things promised. They saw that the promises were "afar off ; " they, 
therefore, in faith, accepted exile, confessing themselves for the time strangers 
and pilgrims on the earth. " They died without receiving the 2>romiscs/' Paul 
says. What is it, then, but that they must rise to receive them ? When ? At 
the time described in Rev. xi. 18, as "the time of the dead that they should be 
judged, and that thou shouldst give reward unto thy servants^ the 'prophets " 
— [Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were prophets — Psalm cv. 15.] — the time, the 
reader will perceive by the context, when " the kingdoms of this world become 



211 

the kingdoms of our Lord and of 7ns Ckrist. — (verse 15.) It is the epoch, 
mentioned by Paul in the following words : ^' Jesus Christ shall judge the 
quick and the dead at Ids a2Tpe€Lri7ig and his hingdomy — (2 Tim. iv. 1.) When 
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob come forth from their graves to judgment and 
reward, theyAvill " receive the land for an inheritance," according to the promise. 
On doing this, they will inherit the kingdom of God, for the kingdom of 
God is to be established there. Hence, says Jesus to the Pharisees — 

"Ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets in the Tcingdom 
of God, and you yourselves thrust out. And they shaU come from the east and 
from the west, and from the north and the south, and shall sit down in tlie kingdom 
0/ (?o<i."— Luke xiii. 28, 29. 

If any one doubt that this will be in the very land promised to the fathers, 
and in which they wandered as strangers, let him read the following testimo- 
nies from the prophets : 

" The Lord shall inherit Judah, Ms portion in the Holy Land, and shall choose 
Jerusalem again." — Zech. ii. 12. 

" But upon Mount Zion shall be deliverance, and there shall be holiness ; and the 
house of Jacob shall possess their possessions . . And the captivity of this 
host of the children of Israel shall possess that of the Canaanites, even unto 
Zarephath ; and the captivity of Jerusalem, which in Sepharad, shall possess the 
cities of the south. And saviours shall come upon Mount Zion to judge the Mount 
of Esau; AND THE KINGDOM SHALL BE THE LOKD'S."— Obadiah 17, 20, 2L 

" In that day, saith the Lord, will I assemble her that halteth,and I will gather her 
that is driven out, and her that I have afflicted. And I will make her that halted 
r- remnant, and her that was cast far off a strong nation: and the LORD SHALL 
REIGN OVER THEM IN MOUNT ZION FROM HENCEFORTH, EVEN FOR 
EVER. And thou, O tower of the flock, the stronghold of the daughter of Zion, 
unto thee shall it come, even the first dominion: the kingdom shall come to the daughter 
of JERUSALEM."— Micah iv. 6-8. 

" Then wiU I remember my covenant with Jacob, and also my covenant with Isaac, 
and also my covenant with Abraham will I remember; AND I WILL REMEMBER 
THE LAND."— Lev. xxvi. 42. 

" Then will the Lord he jealous for Hi^i LAND, and pity His people.'"— Joel ii. IS. 

* ^^Fear not, O, LAND; be glad and rejoice: for the Lord will do great things."— 
Joel ii. 21. 

"A LAND which the Lord thy God careth for; the eyes of the Lord thy God are 
always upon it, from the beginning of the year even unto the end of the year."— 
Deut. xi. 12. 

"And the desolate land shall be tilled, whereas it lay clcsoiatc in tbe sight of all lhp>t 
passed by; and they shall bay, This land that was desolate is become LIKE THE 
GARDEN OP EDEN, and the waste and desolate and ruined cities are become 
fenced, and are inhabited. Then the heathen that arc left round about you slinll 
know that I the Lord build the ruined places, and plant that thai was desolate; 1, THE 
LORD, HAVE SPOKEN IT, AND I WILL DO IT."— E^eli.^^ xxxvi. oi-iJfi. 



212 

"For the Lord shall comfort ZIOX; He vrll comfort all her waste places; and He 
will make her wilderness LIKE EDEN, and her desert LIKE THE GARDEN OP THE 
LORD ; joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving and the voice of 
melody." — Isaiah li. 8. 

^^ Thou shalt no more be termed Forsaken; neither shall THY LAND any more he 
termed Desolate^ but thou shalt be called Hcphzi-bah, and thy land Beulah; for the 
Lord delighteth in thee, and thy land shall be married." — Isaiah Ixii. 4. 

"Whereas thou hast been forsaken and hated, so that no man went through thee* 
I will make thee an eternal excellency, a joy of many generations." — Isaiah Ix. 15. 

When the state of things depicted in these testimonies passes out of the 
domain of prophecy into that of accomplished fact, the "city having 
foundations" and the "heavenly country," which were the ohjects of faith 
with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and the subject of promise to them, will be 
realised. The Scriptural meaning of these phrases will then be exemplified. 
Orthodox interpreters of Paul make them apply to "heaven above the skies:" 
they overlook the fact that the promises related to the land in which the 
fathers sojourned; and forget the absurdity of calling heaven a "heavenly 
country." Palestine will be a heavenly country when Christ, having re- 
established the kingdom of David, rules in it as monarch of the whole earth ; 
and liis kingdom will be " a city having foundations," for it will stand upon a 
rock from which no rude assault of rebellion, whether of democrats or kings, 
will be able to shake it. 

It wiU be observed that Abraham's " seed " is joined with Abraham himself 
in the promises. Paul says that this seed is Christ (Gal. iii. 16), and all who 
are Christ's. — (verse 29.) In view of this, we are bound to give an application 
tf) the promises which may be a little startling to those who have hitherto read 
tlie Bible with an orthodox bias, but which is the only application that a 
rational reading and a child-like belief in the promises can admit, and that is, 
til at Christ and the saints are destined, in conjunction with Abraham, who, in 
fact, will be one of them, to possess and occupy "the land of Israel." From 
this conclusion the orthodox mind will, doubtless, recoil with horror ; but this 
is owing to the perverted condition of the orthodox mind, and not to the nature 
of the conclusion itself ? What is there in the conclusion to justify horror? Is 
it not a beautiful and a fitting conclusion ? If it is the purpose of God to rule 
nankind by Christ and his people, it is meet that they should have a centre of 
operations and head-quarters somewhere on the earth. And where could a 
more appropriate spot be found than the land promised to Abraham ? 
Palestine is situate at the conjunction of the three great continents of the 
eastern hemisphere, and can be approached from any quarter on the great 
oceans. It is the natural centre of universal government ; both for commerce 
and law-giving, it stands in the finest situation there is on earth. In addition 



213 

to this, it is the locality that has witnessed all Grod's operations in the past, down 
to the very crucifixion of His Son, and the sending forth of the gospel ; and 
what more fitting than that it should be the place fixed upon for the 
resumption of his great and mighty acts? The scene of Christ's humiliation ; 
what more befitting than that it should witness his exaltation as monarch of 
^ the earth? But these considerations pale before the strength of the 
•promise. Nothing is needed after the testimony : 

« The law shaU go forth of ZION, and the word of the Lord from JERUSALEM.^— 
Micah iv. 2. 

" The redeemed of the Lord shall return, and come with singing UNTO ZION, and 
everlasting joy shall be upon their head; they shall obtain gladness and joy, and 
sorrow and moujning shall flee away." — Isaiah li. 11. 

• "Rejoice ye with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, all ye that love her; rejoice for 
joy with her all ye that mourn for her, that ye may suck and be satisfied with the 
breasts of her consolations; that ye may milk out, and be delighted with the 
abundance of her glory . . .As one whom his mother comforteth, so will 

I comfort you — and ye shall be comforted IN JERUSALEM." — Isaiah Ixvi. 10 ; 13. 

" Thine eyes shall see JERUSALEM a quiet habitation, a tabernacle that shall not 
be taken down ; not one of the stakes thereof shall ever be removed, neither shall 
any of the cords thereof be broken . . . For the Lord is our judge, the 

Lord is our king; He will save us. — Isaiah xxxiii. 20, 22. He will destroy in this 
mountain the face of the covering cast over all people, and the vail that is spread 
over ail nations. He will swallow up death in victorj^, and the Lord God will wipe 
away tears from off all faces . . .In that day shall this song be sung in 

the land of Judah.'" — Isaiah xxv. 7, 8 ; xxvi. 1. 

" The Redeemer shall come to Zion, and unto them that turn from transgression 
in Jacob." 

" At that time, they shall call JERUSALEM the throne of the Lord."— Jer, iii. 17. 

"Moreover, when ye shall divide by lots the land for inheritance, ye shall offer an 
oblation to the Lord, an holy portion of the land; the length shall be the 
length of five and twenty thousand reeds, and the breadth shall be t-^n thousand'. 
(English measurement, 43 miles by 17.) This shall be holy in all the borders thereof, 
round about. . the sanctuary of the Lord shall be in the midst thereof." 

— Ezek. xlv. 1 ; xlviii. 10. 

".And they (the nations at the end of the thousand j^ears), went up on the breadth 
of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city, 
and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them."— Rev. xx. 9. 

These quotations from the Scriptures illustrate the fulfilment of the promise 
to Abraham as regards his seed — "Christ and the saints.*' They show the 
sense in which the promise is to be understood, and that is the obvious sense, 
the plain sense, viz., that when the kingdom of God is established, and 
Abraham inherits the land, his seed, constituting the divine encampment, will 
be in the land with him, and in a particular part of it, to be allotted for that 
purpose. This allotment, which will include that territory of Judah and 



214 

Jerusalem, will, as we shall see in another lecture, contain an area of about 1784 
square miles, which will be ample enough for the pavilions of the king to be 
spread on a scale becoming the grandeur and majesty of the kingdom. 
Abraham's seed — the bride, the Lamb's wife — the totality of those who, being 
"called, and chosen, and faithful," are the first-fruits unto God and unto the 
Lamb," and found worthy of reigning with Christ, will be a numerous 
progeny; but not too numerous for the country allotted. '* Many are called ; but 
few are chosen^ " Strait is the gate and narrow is the way that leadeth unto life, 
and/<?w there be that find it." True, John describes this few as ^'a multitude 
that no man could number :" but this must be taken as expressing the aspect 
which a large assembly of people would present to the eye, and not as the 
statement of an arithmetical fact. The expression could never be true in the 
absolute sense, for numbers can be computed indefinitely ; but in the sense of a 
crowd being so large and dense as that a man could not reckon them, it is 
quite appropriate. How many people does the reader think could be 
accommodated with standing room in the section of country to be set 
apart for "an holy oblation?" Nearly half the population of the 
globe : that is to say, about five hundred millions. The calculation is 
very simple: it is easy to ascertain how many people could stand in 
a square mile; multiply that number by the number of square miles — 
1784 — and you have the result stated. "We make these apparently unnecessary 
remarks on account of the objection raised to the Bible teaching concerning 
the inheritance of the Holy Land by Jesus and the saints, on the score of the 
impossibility of such a little place holding them all. The objection arises from 
tw^o mistakes : first, the place is not so little ; and second, the number who will 
be with Christ is not so great as popular tradition presumes. At the end of 
the thousand years, there will be a great harvest to be reaped as the result of 
the thousand years' dispensation of light and knowledge ; but at the beginning, 
the number to be associated with Christ as the seed of Abraham, to co-operate 
with him in the blessing of the nations, will be on the limited scale of "first 
fruits;" they are styled ^^the first fruits unto God and to the Lamb." — (Rev. 
xiv. 4.) 

3rd. — That Christ, the seed of Abraham^ is to conqxier the world. — This is the 
third feature of the promise made to Abraham. It is expressed in the words 
*' Thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies." To apprehend the significance 
of this statement, it is necessary to remember that in Oriental countries, in 
ancient times, the gate of a city was the seat of authority. It was the place 
where consultations were held, decrees issued and registered, and where the 
rulers showed themselves to receive the obeisance of the people. For an enemy 
to possess this place, then, was to give evidence of having conquered and 



215 

deposed the original holders of power. Now, it must be evident that the 
promise that Christ should possess the gate of his enemies has not been fulfilled. 
In no sense can an orthodox interpreter make it out that Christ has displaced 
his enemies from the seat of honour, glory, and power. Ungodly men rule the 
world. Christ's own country— the land promised to Abraham — is enslaved by 
the Moslem power, which administers authority and perpetrates its religious 
abominations in the very city which was called by God's name, and which 
Jesus is to make the throne of Jehovah in the future age. Instead of Christ 
possessing the gate of his enemies, the enemy may be said to tread down Christ 
in the gate. The horns of the Gentiles have lifted themselves up over the land 
of Judah to scatter it (Zech. i. 21.), and all pertaining to Abraham and his seed 
is now in waste and desolation. But when the kingdom of God comes, this 
will be changed. God shall speak to the nations in anger and have them in 
derision; Christ shall break them in pieces like a potter's vessel (Ps. ii. 9; Rev. 
ii. 27) ; He shall come forth as a man of war — as the Lion of the tribe of 
Judah — to fight the confederated power of his enemies. — (Hev. xix. 19 ; Zech. 
xiv. 3; Ezek. xxxviii. 21-23.) He shall punish the kings of the earth upon the 
earth. — (Isaiah xxiv. 21.) He shall put down the mighty from their seats, and 
send the rich empty away. — (Luke i.) He shall then possess the gate of his 
enemies. All kings shall bow down before him, and aU nations shall serve 
him. — (Psalm Ixxii. 11.) All people, nations, and languages shall serve and obey 
him ; his dominion is an everlasting dominion that shall not pass away, and 
his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed. — (Dan. vii. 14.) Then will the 
proclamation be sounded in loud paeans of joy throughout the whole earth: 

"THE KINGDOMS OF THIS WOELD ARE BECOME THE 
KINGDOMS OF OUR LORD AND OF HIS CHRIST; AND HE 
SHALL REIGN FOR EVER AND EVER."— (Rev. xi. 15.) 

4th. — That all nations shall be Messed in Abraham and his seed. — This is 
the gospel in a sentence ; so Paul gives us to understand in Gal. iii. 8. The 
attentive reader will be able to discern in it the substance of what Jesus, and the 
apostles preached. They preached "the things concerning the kingdom of 
God and the name of Jesus Christ." — (Acts viii. 12 ; xxviii. 29, 31.) The 
announcement made to Abraham is neither more nor less than these "things " 
compressed into a sentence ; for it announces in a general form what the others 
disclose in particulars. It tells of universal blessing in connection with 
Abraham and Christ ; while these make plain the process by which the bless- 
ing is carried into effect : first in relation to individuals ; and then in relation 
to nations. It must be evident that it is not yet realised. The nations are not 
in a state of blessing. Not only groaning under misrule, they are in a state of 



I 



r 216 T 

poverty, ignorance, and misery, which is the opposite of blessedness. The 

world lieth in wickedness. Abraham and his seed are unknown, except as 

objects of derision. Even in " happy England," unbelief and vice are the 

order of the day. There is an external appearance of godliness : much church 

and chapel building, Sunday school teaching, sermon hearing, prayer saying, ■ 

collection making, bazaar holding, &c. ; but what is there inside but rotten- 

ness and dead men's bones ? The people who do these things are either selfish, 

superstitious, or ignorant. There is little fear of God or regard for His word. 

There is much fear of man and love of the world. People are befooled and 

degraded : their brains are bemuddled with Paganism in regard to Christianity, 

and their hearts eaten out by the exigencies of social caste and filthy lucre. 

All nations are not yet blessed in Abraham and his seed: but they will be; 

for we read — 

" Behold a king shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment • 
and the eyes of them that see shall not be dim, and the ears of them that hear 
shall hearken. The heart also of the rash shall understand knowle Ige, and the 
tongue of the stammerer shall be ready to speak plainly." — Isaiah xxxii. 1, 3, 4. 

"In that day shaU the deaf hear the words of the book; the eyes of the blind 
shall see out of obscurity and out of darkness. The meek also shall :'ncreas3 their 
joy in the Lord, and the poor among men shall rejoice in the Holy One of Israel, for 
the terrible one is brought to naught and the scorner is consumed, and all that 
watch for iniquity are cut off." — Isaiah xxix. 18, 20. 

" Say to them that are of a fearful heart, Be strong, fear not ; and behold your God 
will come with vengeance, even God with a recompense ; He will come and 
eave you. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the enrs of the deaf shall 
be unstopped. Then shall the lame man leap as a hart, and the tongue of the 
dumb sing."— Isaiah xxxv. 4, 6. 

"From the rising of the sun, even unto the going down of the same, my name shall 
be great among the Gentiles, and, in every place, incense shall be offered unto my 
name, and a pure offering, for my name shall be great among the heathen, saith 
the Lord of Hosts."— Mai. i. 11. 

" The battle-bow shall be cut off, and He shall speak peace unto the heathen, and His 
dominion shall be from sea even to sea, and from the river even to the ends of the 
earth."— Zech. ix. 10. 

" Many people and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of Hosts in 
Jerusalem, and to pray before the Lord."— Zech. viii. 22. 

" Many nations shall be joined to the Lord in that day, and shall be my people."— 
Zech. ii. 11. 

" The earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as tho 
waters cover the sea." — Hab. ii. 14. 

" They shall fear Thee as long as the sun and moon endure, throughout all 
generations. He shall come down like rain upon the mown grass, as showers that 
water the earth. In His days shall the righteous flourish, and abundance of peace, 
so long as the moon endureth. . . .He shall deliver the needy when He 

crieth j the poor also and him that hath no helper. He shall spare the poor and 



217 

needy, and shall save the souls of the needy. He shall redeem their souls irom 
deceit and violence, and precious shall their blood be in His sight. . 
His name shall endure for ever. His name shall be continued as long as the sun, 
and men shall be blessed in Him\ all nations shall call Him blessed.'^ — Psalm Ixxii. 5-7, 
12-14, 17. 

These testimonies illustrate the blessing guaranteed for '' all families of the 
earth" in the promises made to Abraham: they show what the blessedness 
consists of in its full development. It is no imaginary blessedness ; but the 
bestowal of just those substantial boons which the whole world is yearning 
after, but knows not how to compass. These, however, will not be reahsed till 
the kingdom of God comes. They cannot be attained before that time ; for it 
requires a righteous and resistless despot to eject all other rulers from place 
and power before they become practicable. It requires power, wisdom, 
righteousness, and humanity to concentre in a universal king, before the 
nations can be made righteous, prosperous, and happy. In a word, it requires 
Christ, the seed of Abraham, to take the world's affairs into his own hands, 
before there can ever be " glory to G-od in the Highest, peace on earth, and 
goodwill among men." The blessing of Abraham is realised individually, at 
the present time, in proportion as people lay hold of the promises by faith, and 
become heirs of future exaltation, through present submission to Christ; but 
the state of things covenanted to Abraham in the promises, will never be 
realised until Abraham himseK inherits the land, and his seed possesses the 
gate of his enemies. 

In view of the evident conclusion that the promises to Abraham give an 
imconditional guarantee of "good things to come," it may be asked, why the 
law of Moses, and the bitter national experience of the Jews, have been allowed 
to intervene between them and their fulfilment ? Paul anticipates and answers 
this question in Gal. iii. 19 : " Wherefore, then, serveth the law ? It was 
added because of transgression till the seed should come to whom the promise 
was made." If we wish to know the purpose it served, we find the in- 
formation five verses down : " The law was our sclwolmaster unto Christ." — 
(verse 24.) On account of the almost undisturbed reign of ignorance and sin 
in the times when the promises were delivered, it was necessary to institute a 
schoolmaster administration of the divine mind, which should inculcate those 
first lessons concerning God, without which nothing good could be 
accomplished, since their existence in the human mind is the very basis of the 
community between God and man, which honours him and saves thorn. It 
was necessary to engrain those first principles on the mind of the chosen 
nation, by way of paving tho way for the development of the state of things 
promised to the fathers. This was done by the estabhshmcnt of the law of 
Moses in the midst of Israel— a system which, in itseH, was a mere allegory 



218 

of divine truth, as "vras meet in the training of children /Heb. x. 1), bnt 
which, by its exactions, severities, and scrupulosities, engraved in deep and 
lasting characters the estimate of the Deity's relation to mankind, which even 
now prevails in a mild dcgTce wherever Mosaic tradition has reached. The 
power, supremacy, and hoHness of Deity were made palpable by it, even to 
those who were disobedient ; and, in the course of centuries, that conception 
of God was formed which existed in the days of Jesus, as the foundation on which 
to push forward the operations by which the seed of Abraham (faithful believers) 
should be provided by the promulgation of the word of faith. "Without the law, 
there is no doubt that the knowledge of God would have perished from the 
earth, and that mankind would have been wholly enslaved by the foolishness 
and unenlightened speculation, and abandoned to the wickedness which pre- 
vailed before the flood; the little Hght of the promises would soon have 
been extinguished, and the world would have been sunk in the darkness of 
incurable barbarism — ripe for as complete a destruction as that which 
overtook it in the days of Noah. This great catastrophe was prevented by 
the establishment of a system which, while (superficially considered) it offered 
an obstruction to the glorious consummation promised to Abraham, was 
potently influential in developing the moral situation among mankind which 
was necessary to the bestowment of the promised blessing. 

The promises form the groundwork of what is termed "the Christian 
dispensation." It was necessary that God should create a title to the blessings 
of His love, for men to lay hold of ; because, as sinners, they were without hope, 
and could not establish a title for themselves. It was necessary He should 
make the first advance ; and He did so, by bestowing an unconditional promise 
upon Abraham, whom He selected for his faithfulness. These, by the belief 
of them, gave Abraham a right to the things promised, and vested in him and 
his seed the sole title. Hence the necessity for becoming Abraham's seed by 
connection with Christ before a Gentile can have any hope of a future life and 
inheritance. 

Something in addition to the promise was, however, necessary to secure to 
Abraham the blessings covenanted : this i« styled the " confirmation " of the 
promises. The precise meaning of this will be apy)arent on a review of the 
facts of the case as affecting Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It was promised to 
them that they should possess the land of Palestine for ever. t'or this 
promise to be carried out, it is necessary that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob be 
raised from the dead, and made to live for ever. Hence it may be taken that 
the promises carry this feature with them ; that, in. fact, they bear upon the . 
face of them an 'undertaking on the part of God, that, at the time appointed ' 
for the realization of the promise, He would bring them from the dust c 



219 

death, and give them eternal life ; how else can they inherit the land for ever ? 
That this was G-od's intention toward them is made evident by Christ's 
argument with the Sadducees on the resurrection. He says : " But, as 
touching the resurrection of the dead, have ye not read that which was 
spoken unto you by God, saying, / aon the God of Abraham, and the God of 
Isaac, and the God of Jacol) ? G-od is not the G-od of the dead, but of the 
living." — (Matt. xxii. 31, 32.) Christ argued that the circumstance of G-od 
calling himself the God of the fathers who had gone to the dust, was proof of 
His intention to raise them ; and the argument overpowered the Sadducees, 
who were "put to silence." Thus, the inference that the promises to 
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob involved the promise of resurrection and immor- 
tality, is established beyond question by Christ. This being so, we have to 
realise the fact that, under the circumstances existing at the time of the 
promise, it is impossible the things promised could be bestowed. Abraham, 
Isaac, and Jacob were constitutionally under sentence of death. They were 
"in Adam" — sinners by descent and individual act, and, therefore, precluded 
from that resurrection to immortality implied in the promise. Yet the 
inheritance was guaranteed by "two immutable things" — the promise and 
the oath — and as "it was impossible that God should lie," its bestowment 
was a matter of necessity. How was the impossibility of making sinners 
immortal to be reconciled with the necessity that God's promises should be 
fulfilled ? "We find the answer in the work accomplished by Christ at his first 
advent. " He confirmed the promises made unto the fathers." How ? By 
making their fulfilment possible. And how did he do this ? By 
" shedding his blood (which he styled " the blood of the nev\' — or 
Abrahamic — covenant ") for the sins of many." He took away sin by the 
sacrifice of himself, thereby unsealing the g'ates of death, and bringing life 
and immortality to light — opening the way for the fulfilment of aU that had 
been promised beforehand to the fathers. Tlius the impossibility vanished, 
and the necessity was placed in the triumphant basis of Christ's accomplished 
work. This v/as the great event shadowed in the sacrifices of the law, which 
were not in themselves of any value, except as a means of connection between 
God and His nation, typifying a higher and a more enduring connection to l>e 
established over the body of the slain " Lamb of God taking away the sins of 
the world." 

Christ's death, in relation to the promises, is put in another light in Heb. ix. 
16, 17, where these words occur : "Where a testament is, there must also of 
necessity be the death of the testator. For a testament is of force after men 
are dead: otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator livcth." Hero 
he comi^ares the promises to a testament or will, requiring the death of the 



220 

individual making the will before it can come into force. Now, in this case, 
God was the testator, and it was impossible that God should die: but the 
necessity of the case was met by God manifesting himseK through Jesus, and, 
in him, submitting to death, by which the will, bequeathing eternal life and 
everlasting possession of the land to Abraham and his multitudinous seed, 
came into force. 

It will be seen that the things declared in the prophets and preached in the 
aggregate by the apostles as " the things concerning the kingdom of God and 
the name of Jesus Christ," are but the elaboration of "the promises made of 
God unto the fathers," in which they have their legal origin and efficacy. It 
is important to recognise this fact so that the position of the saints as "children 
of Abraham" and "the seed of Abraham" may be clearly apprehended, and 
that we may see the harmony and completeness of God's plan, as commenced 
in the days of Abraham, typified in the law, and gradually unfolded through 
the prophets, and consummated in the proclamation of Jesus and the apostles. 

In view of all these things, well may we exclaim with Paul (Rom. xi. 33-36,) 
" O, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God ! How 
unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding out. For who hath 
known the mind of the Lord ? Or who hath been His counsellor ? Or who hath 
first given to Him, and it shall be recompensed unto Him again ? For of Him, 
and through Him, and to Him are aU things ; to whom be glory for ever. 
Amen." 



LECTUEE VII. 



THE KINGDOM OF GOB TEJE FINAL INSTBUMFXTALITY IN TEE 
GREAT SCHEME OF HUMAN REHEMFTION 

In all God's doings there is purpose. He does nothing from caprice, nothing 
from undesigning impidse. Everything is planned; everything adapted with 
the utmost exactness of wisdom to the accomplishment of a pre- determined 
end; all His plans are characterised by illimitable comprehensiveness of 
bearing, like His own mind, which takes into account the infinitude of minute 
circumstance and remote contingency that surround us, "knowing all thin<:>-s 



4 



221 

from the end to the beginning." He is wise— He makes no mistakes; and He 
is economical — He wastes no effort. He accomplishes as much as possible with 
as little as possible. The result always transcends the means: the good 
always overtops and outnumbers the evil. When, therefore, we are called 
upon to contemplate any declared purpose of Grod, we are presented with a 
sublime subject of study; because such subject is sure to have in it a depth 
and fertility which it is delightful to the mind to explore. This is true of 
God's natural wonders in creation, where we see all these principles abundantly 
exemplified; how much more is it true of His schemes in relation to the 
intelligent creatures whom He has formed in His own image ? 

Now the testimony advanced ia previous lectures clearly demonstrates the 
purpose of God to interfere in human affairs, to destroy every form of human 
government at present existing on earth, and to establish a visible kingdom of 
His own. It shows that when the time arrives. He will take the power out of 
the hands of the erring mortals who now possess it, and transfer it to Jesus 
Christ and his "called and chosen, and faithful" ones, who will administer 
the affairs of the world in wisdom and righteousness This being the purpose, 
it now remains for us to enquire what is the object of the purpose, and what 
its consummation To some, it will seem out of joint with the scheme which 
proposes the restoration of the human family to friendship with their Creator, 
and their exaltation to angelic existence. The question will be asked, Is this 
divine ruling of nations on earth to be eternal ? Is the Almighty's purpose with 
mankind to rise no higher than perfection in the government of mortal 
generations ? Is this the glorious salvation which dwelt from everlasting in 
the bosom of the Eternal, which the prophets sung, and which the Son of 
God confirmed in tears and blood ? The answers to these questions, derivable 
from the Scriptures, wiU allay the incredulity indicated by them, if the 
questioner be conscientious and devout. The kingdom of God is itself but an 
instrumentality — another step in the march of God's beneficent scheme — 
another stage iu the accomplishment of His purpose to " gather together iit 
one all things in Christ."— (Eph. i. 10.) It only lasts for a thousand years 
(Rev. XX. 6.) What is to be accomplished during this period ? Paul says 
" He (Jesus) must reign till he hath put ALL ENEMIES nnde?* his feet. 
The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." — (1 Cor. xv. 25-26.) 
Hence, the millennial mission of Christ is to subdue "all enemies," which he 
will accomplish within the period of a thousand years But it must be noted 
that the "enemies" spoken of are not necessarily personal enemies, for death is 
mentioned as the last of them, which we know to be an evil event, and not a 
persbnal adversary. Hence, we may understand Paul's statement to mean 
that " he must reign till he hath subdued every evil." This being so, we 



222 

lia'V« a starting point supplied to us in our endeavour to understand the 
mission of the kingdom of God, It is to subdue "all enemies," or every 
evil. 

Now the *'all enemies" are of various kinds. The first class that will be 
Bubjected to the subduing power of the kingdom are the governments of the 
earth, *' It shall break in pieces and consume all other 'kingdoms.'" — (Dan. ii, 
44.) This is its first operation — to break up the existing arrangement of things 
^political — to take the government of mankind out of the hands of mortals, and 
place it in the hands of the King whom God has prepared as the all- wise, and 
all-just, and all-humane " governor of the nations," Now it must be admitted 
that this will be a great thing accomplished, a great enemy subdued; for where 
do some of the greatest evils under the sun originate but in the bad government 
of the world? Look at "savage" countries. J'or want of government, 
human violence runs rampant ; caprice and passion reign ; might is right ; 
brute force, under the guidance of selfish iastinct, rules the day ; and mankind, 
instead of dwelling together in social unity and concord, herd in warring 
factions, and disgrace tiie name of man by the enormities of their practices. 
Human life and the possession of property are uncertainties of the hour ; the 
weak are overridden, the innocent are victimised, and him that hath no helper 
is helpless indeed, under those circumstances. " The dark places of the earth 
are full of the habitations of cruelty." — (Psalm Ixxiv. 20.) 

How much better are the semi-barbarous nations of China, Japan, &-c. ? 
^sotted ignorance and selfishness concentrated in a despotic emperor and 
aristocracy, provide and enforce laws which outrage justice, and multiply 
social evils indefinitely. The uncertain barbarities of African life are, in 
some respects, to be preferred to the consolidated tyrannies of Asiatic rule ; 
for in the former case, encroachment may be resented vrith success — man 
against man — tribe agairist tribe ; but what chance is there against the hoary 
dynasties, the organized oppressions, of central Asia ? 

Coming into the civilized world, things get a little more decent ; but not much 
the better for their decency. Look at Russia ; look at Poland ; look at Italy ; 
look at Prance, which at present stands foremost in the world's politics ; what 
do we find ? The suppression of free speech — the deprivation of personal 
liberty — the invasion of personal rights — the military enforcement of despotism 
in all that relates to private life ; and the consequent result in the dwarfed 
intellect, the stunted moral hf e, the withered enterprise of the population — the 
universal ignorance and degradation which blots the civilization of the 
vaunted nineteenth century. 

And do we find no bad government in our own favoured country ? Thanks 
be to God, xve Jbav€ less to complain of than -any people under heaven ; but 



I 



22^ 

Is there no class usiirpatioTi? no monopoly of the soil? no surfeiting of a 
pampered few at the expense of starving and groaning millions ? Ay, there 
are more evils than the neck accustomed to the halter is sensible of. There is 
more misery and wretchedness, and crime in this country, than decent, well-to- 
do people, absorbed in their own little concerns, are in the habit of thinking 
^about ; and, in great part, the evil comes from a system which ieeps the 
wealth of the country in a few hands, and deprives the majority of the 
opportunity of realizing the true objects and enjoyments of life. The law is 
also administered with a circumlocution and a guardedness which, though 
indispensable in the present fallible order of things, often defeat justice on the 
one hand, and victimize the innocent on the other. These are evils that 
cannot be cured in the present age ; most of them result from necessities 
imposed upon society by human fallibility and impotence. They 
illustrate the utter inadequacy of human government to deal with the affairs 
of mankind, so as to promote the general good and secure the objects of 
'existence to all. 

Surveying the world of human government as a whole, then, we see the 
greatness of the first enemy which the kingdom of God will subdue, and are 
enabled to appreciate its political mission. The subjugation of the powers 
that be will be its first achievement, resulting in "the kingdoms of this 
world " becoming "the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ ; " (Eev< xL 
15 ;) and for human administration, it will substitute the reign of one 
universal divinely-appointed ruler. " The Lord shall be King over all the 
earth: in. that day shall there be one Lord and His name One." — (Zech. xiv. 9,j 
The result of this will be the cure of all the evils enumerated. " Savage " 
countries, Asiatic countries, European countries, will aU come under the sway 
of His "rod of iron," which will "break in pieces the oppressor." AU. 
inimical institutions and practices will fall before the vigour which destroye 
Jdngdoms ; individual misdemeanour will be restrained by the indomitable 
power that breaks dynasties. A universal despotism, wielded with wisdom, 
and humanity, will rule in general and detail — nothing too vast for its scope, 
nothing too small for its notice : and thus will African peccadillo and Europe's 
grander antagonisms be suppressed by the same omnipotent hand, ^nd al. 
countries brought into harmony with the spirit of the age. 

« He shall judge the poor of the jpeople, he shall save the children of the needy and 
shall break in pieces the oppressor. They shall fear Thee as long as the sun and 
moon endure, throughout all generation. He shall come down like rain upon the 
mown grass : as showers that water the eai-th. In His days shall the righteaufi 
flourish; and abundance of peace so long as the moon cndureth. He shall lia."w© 
dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth. Thejr 
ithat 4wen .in4ihe v/ildemoes ^all bow before Him.j .And ilis enemies shalllickilie 



224 

dnst. The kings of Tarshish and of the isles shall bring presents ; the kings of 
Sheba and Seba shall offer gifts. Yea, all kings shall fall down before Him; all 
nations shall serve Him. For He shall deliver the needy when he crieth ; the poor 
also, and him that hath no helper. He shall spare the poor and needy, and shall 
gave the souls of the needy. He shall redeem their soul from deceit and violence, 
and precious shall their blood be in His sight. His name shall endure for ever ; His 
name shall be continued as long as the sun ; and men shall be blessed in Him; all 
nations shall call Him blessed."— Psalm Ixxii. 4-14, 17. 

But there is another enemy that may survive the destruction of those of a 
political caste, and that is the ignorance and depravity of the people 
themselves. This, philanthropic men are now trying to cure by various 
agencies in operation. Mechanics' Institutions, Temperance Societies, 
Missionary Societies, Home Missions, &c., are among the instrumentalities by 
which reformers hope to improve the world, and bring about the "millennium;" 
but the idea is vain. The regeneration of the world is beyond human 
accomplishment. Benefit is no doubt resulting from the educational and 
reformatory activities of the present century, but how partial it is where 
conferred. EJaowledge is extended in every form; but that does not 
necessarily mean improvement. Morality and religion are not progressing 
with education. It is now admitted by the thoughtful among public 
reformers, who once thought more sanguinely, that the world, if getting more 
clever, is not growing better; and facts justify the belief. Eobust and manly 
principle grows more stunted as knowledge increases. Flippancy is the order 
of the day; scepticism is leavening society with alarming progress; and 
instead of an approaching millennium, we are, to all human appearance, drifting 
upon an age when the exigencies of commercial competition will have eaten 
out the moral sense, and blunted the generous feelings of the people ; when 
morals will be practised merely for the purpose of keeping on the right side of 
the law, and religion professed with a view to customers. But turn, reader, 
from this picture : under the guidance of the Scriptures, decline to trust an 
arm of flesh in a matter so utterly beyond its control ; and take refuge in the 
consoling assurances of those "holy men of old, who spake as they were moved 
by the Holy Spirit." 

" The earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the 
waters cover the sea.' — Hab. ii. 14. 

When the earth is filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, it is 
clear that civilised ignorance and untutored barbarism will have vanished; but 
how is this knowledge to be disseminated 'r The answer to this introduces us 
to what we shall caU the second mission of the kingdom. When the 
governments of the earth have been broken up and dissipated, and divine 
authority established with firm hand in every part of the globe, the next thing 



225 

to be done is the enlightenment and elevation of the * peoples, nations, and 

languages " that will then have transferred their allegiance to the Lion of the 

Tribe of Judah. This is done by a process which will afford pleasure and 

honour to the rulers of the age, while conferring benefit en the subject people. 

*' At that time," says Jeremiah, chap. iii. 17, ^'they shall call Jerusalem the 

THEONE OF THE LoED, and all ilm nations shall be gathered unto it, to the name 

of the Lord, to Jerusalem: neither shall they walk any more after the 

imagination of their evil hearts J' Here is a turning from evil on the part of 

the nations as the result of a gathering to Jerusalem, when occupied as the 

t?hrone of the Lord. There is an effect and a cause; but what is the connection 

between them? How does the one result from the other? The answer is, 

because from Jerusalem emanates a teaching which, divinely administered, 

works an intellectual and moral reformation in the recipients thereof. This is 

evident from the following testimony : 

"And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of 
the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; sjiA He will teach us of His ways, and ice will 
walk in His paths : for out ©f Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the 
Lord from Jerusalem. And He shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke 
many people : and they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears 
into pruning hooks : nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they 
learn war any more." — Isaiah ii. 3, 4. 

Jerusalem was the centre from which the gospel under the present dispensa- 
tion radiated, and Jerusalem in the future age is again to be the source of divine 
illumination, but on a larger and grander scale, and with more glorious results. 
Jerusalem was the scene of the Bedeemer's humiliation and anguish ; it is to 
be the witness of his exaltation and joy ; but more of this hereafter. The 
sweet ameliorating influences to be located in Jerusalem in the coming age, 
are represented in the following beautiful metaphor from Isaeiah: — 

"And in this mountain shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people a feast of fat 
things, a feast of wines on the lees, of fat things full ofmarroio, of wines on the lees ivell 
refined. And he will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast 
over all people, and the vail that is spread over all nations. He will 
swallow up death in victory ; and the Lord God will wipe away tears from off all 
faces; and the rebuke of His people shall He take away from off all the earth : for the 
Lord hath spoken it. And it shall be said in that day, Lo, this is our God ; we have 
waited for Him, and He will save us ; this is the Lord, we have waited for Him, we 
will be glad and rejoice in His salvation." — Isaiah xxv. 6, 9. 

The feast is to be provided in Mount Zion; this is the reason why the nations 
gather there to partake of it; their gathering, however, will not be simultaneous. 
*'God is not the author of confusion," says Paul : the aggregation of the world's 
populations in such a comparatively small neighbourhood would certainly 
involve confusion The prophetic testimony shows that there will be a 
pilgrimage from all parts of the earth from one year's end to the other, in 



226 

idiicli all nations will take their turn. It will be periodical, and take place m 
^very case once a year, as is evident from Zech. xiv. 16, 17. 

" And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the nations which ca^«3 
against Jerusalem, shall even go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of 
Hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles. And it shall be, that whoso will not 
come up of all the families of the earth unto Jerusalem to worship the King, the 
Lca-d of Hosts, even upon them shall be no rain." 

This annual pilgrimage will be fraught with many blessings to the nations* 
To individuals it will be annual relief from the routine of common life, (which 
loutine at the same time, will be vastly less laborious, as to the duration and 
aiaooner of occupation from what obtains now,) and an annual refreshing 
physically by travel, and spiritually by contemplation of the objects of the 
Journey, and by the actual instruction received at " the city of the great king." 
JS'ationally, it will be a yearly riveting of the bonds of happy and contented 
allegiance that will bind all people to the throne of Da^dd, occupied by hia 
illustrious son — Jesus of ISTazareth, Son of God, and King of the Jews. This 
glorious epoch in the world's history is alluded to in, the following quotation 
from Psalm cii. verses 13-22. 

"Thou shalt arise, and have merer upon Zion ; tor the time to favour her, yea, the 
set time is come. For thy servants take pleasure in her stones, and favour the dust 
thereof. So the heathen shall fear the name of the Lord, and all the kings of the 
«arth thy glory.. When the Lord shall build up Zion, he shall appear in his glory. 
He will regard the prayer of the destitute, and not despise their prayer.. This shall 
be written for the generation to come : and the people which shall be created shall 
praise the Lord. For He hath looked down from the height of His sanctuary, from 
heaven did the Lord behold the earth ;. to hear the groaning of the prisoner : to loose 
those that are appointed to death ; to declare the name of the Lord in Zion, and His 
praise in Jerusalem, when the people are gathered together,, and the kingdoms j to serve 
the Lord." 

Thus will the earth become filled with the knowledge of the Lord as the waters 
cover the sea, and thus will all nations be turned from the imaginations of 
their evil heart as they never can be turned by a fallible, unattested propaganda. 
Th«n will be realized the petition, "Thy will be done on earth as it is done in 
heaven ;" and then will be fulfilled the prophetic song of the angels, chanted 
at the birth of him who was to be its accomphsher, " Glory to God in the 
highest, peace on earth, and good- will among men." 

"And the last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." Death will continue 
its ravages during the thousand years — not among the rulers, Jesus and the 
saints who are immortal, but among the subject nations who continue a,s they 
ure now, the death-stricken descendants of the first Adam. 'The child shall 
die an hundred years old." — (Isaiah Ixv. 20.) But ultimately, death itself shall 
be abolished. Its subjugation, however, comes last in order: all other enemies 
«a:e got out of the way first; and then the greatest and most formidable ia 



227 

removed for ever from tMs fair part of God's universe. But on what principle 
is this to be effected? Seeing that all the saved pertaining to this and past 
dispensations will be admitted to life at the coming of the Lord Jesus Clirist^ 
and associated with him in the government of the world, on what principle are- 
the mortal subjects of Messiah's reign to be dealt with, so as to admit of the- 
extirpation of death from among them ? We are admitted to the solution of 
this difficulty in Eev. xx. We shall quote entire that part of the chapter which 
relates to the point in hand, verses 7-15 : — 

"And when tlie thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison,, 
and shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, 
Gog and Magog, ta gather them together to battle, the number of whom is as tho 
sand of the sea. And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the. 
camp of the saints about, and the beloved city; and fire came down from God, out of 
heaven, and devoured them. And the devil that deceived them was cast into the 
lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are,. an4 shall be 
tormented day and night for ever and ever. And I saw a great white throne, and. 
Him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away, and there 
was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before 
God; and the books were opened i- and another book was opened, which is the book 
of life ; and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, 
according to their works. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it ; and death 
and hell delivered up the dead which were in them ; and they were judged 
every man according to their works.. And death and hell were cast into the lake of 
fire. This is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the book of 
life, was cast into the lake of fire." 

Here we have a predicted insurrection at the close of the millennium, which ia 
allowed to gather strength, and come to head, and which is then to be summarily 
suppressed by an outburst of divine judgment in the neighbourhood of "tho 
beloved city" — Jerusalem. This is followed by a general judgment. Now 
who are arraigned at this judgment ? It cannot be the saints who have beerv 
associated with Christ in government during the previous thousand years, wha 
at the beginning of his reign have been welcomed as " good and faithful ser- 
vants " into his joy. These have been judged already. They appeared beforo 
his judgment-seat at his cjoming, and gave an account, and were dealt with 
accordingly. 

Who, then, are thus to be judged at the close of the thousand years ? Obviously 
those who have lived during the thousand years. They are judged out of 
the books related to their own dispensation ; we of this dispensation shall bo 
judged by the book in our possession — the Bible. Jesus says ^'The word that 
I have spoken, the same shall judge you in the last day J" — (John xii. 48.) 
But the post-adventual inhabitants of the earth will, in all probability, stand 
related to different books. The nature of the books is not specified. " Tlie dead 
were judged out of those things which were written in tho books." Doubtless^ 
the subjects of Messiah's kingdom will be placed under a different system fron.\ 



228 

that which we are connected with, and, no doubt, it will be of such a nature as, 
notwithstanding" the visible manifestation of divine power among them, will 
equally call their faith into exercise as ours ; for, "without faith it is impossible 
to please God." They will have an opportunity of attaining to eternal life at 
the close of the thousand years ; but the conditions will, in all probability, be 
diflPerent. However that may be, it is the result of the judgment that we are 
now concerned to understand. Many of those judged are found " written in the 
book of life," and these receive eternal life, which Paul says " God will reward 
to those who, by a patient continuance in well doing, seek for glory, honour, 
and immortality." — (Rom. ii. 7.) But what becomes of the remainder ? The 
answer is, " Whosoever was not found written in the book of life, was cast 
into the lake of fire.'' Now what does this lake of fire mean ? It is one of 
the symbols employed in the Apocalypse. The Apocalypse is full of symbol. 
It is " the revelation of Jesus Christ .... SIGNIFIED by 
his angel" — a revelation indicated by sign, as the sequel shows. The 
prophetic facts intended to be communicated are pourtrayed in symbol, and an 
occasional hint of interpretation is dropped to enable "his servants" 
to decipher the hieroglyphs employed. Concerning a certain woman, for in- 
stance, that John saw in vision, he was informed (Rev. xvii. 18), "The 
WOMAN that thou sawest is that geeat city that reigneth over the kings of the 
earth." Here was the symbol explained, and by the light of this partial 
explanation, we are enabled to work out the significance of the rest of the 
vision, of which the woman forms a part. So with the lake of fire ; a hint of 
interpretation is dropped (chap. xx. verse 14). " This is the secokd death ; " or, 
to make the matter more certain, (Rev. xxi. 8), " All liars shall have their part 
in the lake which bumeth with fire and brimstone, which is the second death." 
Here, the lake of fire is introduced to us as a symbol signifying the second 
death. What is the second death? "Second" implies a first. We cannot 
conceive of a second without the antecedent figure — one. Where then shall 
we look for the first death ? Obviously to that " accident of life " which 
overtakes all the living : " It is appointed unto men once to die." A wicked 
man dies in the natural course of events ; but if amenable to judgment, he 
is raised again — restored to life for punishment. And what follows judgment ? 
Condemnation — few stripes or many stripes. And what after the stripes ? 
Death a second time ; but a death different to the first, inasmuch as it is directly 
inflicted by divine displeasure, and consigns its victims to an oblivion from 
which there is no reclaim by resurrection. It is a death that wipes away every 
vestige of their being from God's creation. " The day that cometh," says 
Malachi (chap. iv. 1), " shall burn them up, f^«?^ -i^ shall leave them neither 
root nor branch.'' And David's declaration is, that "The enemies of the Lord 



229 

shall be as the fat of lambs. They shall consume ; into smoke shall they con- 
sume away." — (Psalm xxxvii. 20.) How appropriate a symbol of such a fate 
is a lake of fire. The only conception we can have of such a thing is supplied 
by the incandescent iron to be seen at blast furnaces. Throw an animal into 
one of those pools, and what is the result? Instant annihilation. Not a 
vestige of the creature's substance survives the action of the destructive element. 
Complete, and immediate, and irretrievable destruction, then, is the idea 
suggested by a lake of fire ; and how appropriate is such a symbol to signify 
the second death, which will destroy, with double destruction, even " soul and 
body."— (Matt. x. 28.) 

When every one not found written in the book of life is cast into the lake of 
fire, what remains but the fulfilment of Paul's statement, that " death shall 
be destroyed?" All that are sinful, and, therefore, deathful, are destroyed, and 
death is, therefore, literally destroyed with them, because there will then be 
none besides upon whom it can prey. And, death being destroyed, what is the 
picture ? A population of deathless beings, reclaimed by God's intervention 
from the sin and death which now curse our planet. With these considerations 
in view, the following testimonies will be fully appreciated : 

" The face of the Lord is against them that do evil, to cut off the remembrance of 
them from the earth." — Psalm xxxiv. 16. 

"Let the wicked be ashamed ; let them he silent in the grave." — Psalm, xxxi. 17. 

" For evil doers shall be cut off; but those that wait upon the Lord they shall inherit the 
earth; for yet a little while, and the wicked shall not be, yea, thou shalt diligently 
consider his place and it shall not be ; but the meek shall inherit the earth, and shall 
delight themselves in the abundance of peace.' — Psalm xxxvii. 9-11. 

"Wait on the Lord and keep His way, and He shall exalt thee to inherit the land ; 
when the wicked are cut off thou shalt see it.'' — Psalm xxxvii. 34 

" Let the sinners be consumed out of the earth, and let the wicked be no more." — 
Psalm civ. 35. 

" The upright shall dwell in the land, and the perfect shall remain in it ; but the 
wicked shall be cut off from the earth, and the transgressors shall be rooted out of it." — 
Prov. ii. 21, 22. 

" As the whirlwind passeth, so is the wicked no more, but the righteous is an ever- 
lasting foundation . . The righteous shall never be removed, but the wicked 
shall not inherit the earth." — Prov. x. 25, 30. 

" Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth." — Matt. v. 5. 
We have to note another feature of the change that takes place at the end, 
indicated by Paul in the following words : 

"Then cometh the end, lohen he (Christ) shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, 
even the Father, when he shall have put down all rule, and all authority and power ; for 
he must reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy that shall 
be destroyed is death . . and when all things shall be subdued unto the Sou, 

then shall the Son also himself be subject unto Him that put all things under /liwi, 
that God may be all in all."—l Cor. xv. 24-28. 



230 

From this we learn that Christ at the end of the thousand years is to abdicate- 
his position of absolute sovereignty. It would seem as if, on the accomplish- 
ment of his mission as a mediator in the complete redemption of the world, he. 
steps down from his high position at the end of the thousand years, that God 
himself may be manifested (without amedium) as the only eternal Governor; yet, 
though no longer the supreme Kuler of the earth, Christ will doubtless continue 
throughout the eternal ages, to occupy a position of peculiar pre-eminence as 
"Captain" of the "many sons" whom he will have been instrumental in 
"bringing to glory." Nevertheless, God will be "all in all." He will be 
manifested as the power, and supporter, and constitutor of all, the Alpha and 
Omega, the beginning and ending, the only self -Almighty one. He will no 
longer work by interposition. He will no longer deal with man mediatively i 
He will establish direct communication with his perfected children; and the 
world — freed from sin and death — will become a happy, loyal, glory-giving 
province in that akeady universal dominion which extends to the utmost 
boimds of space, reflecting; the vn.sdom and the goodness of the Highest. The 
divine scheme of redemption will then have been consummated; and earth's, 
glorified inhabitants — holy gratitude swelling their bosoms ; exalted employ- 
ment engaging their god-like powers ; and an eternity of unbroken felicity 
lying before them — will realize the veritv of perfection ia the thrilling delight* 
ocf faultless existence. 

It will thus be seen that the kingdom of the thousand years is but a. 
transitional period between the purely animal and purely spiritual ages. It 
will blend the elements of both. It will exhibit the perfection of eternal ages 
tn the Lord Jesus and the saints who will be immortal and incorruptible, and 
exemplify the imperfection of the human age in the mortal population wha 
will constitute the subjects of their rule. Eoth will co-exist for a thousand 
years, and will constitute a state of things as superior to the present dispen- 
sation as it will be inferior to the glory ages beyond. The kingdom of God will 
lead us by a bridge of a thousand years from the age of human defection to thd 
time of perfect restoration to the bosom of the Deity. 



231 



LECTUEE VIH. 



CEEI8T TEJE FVTXIRE KING OF TEE WORLD. 

The object of this lecture is to demonstrate the truth of the proposition 
which stands as its title, understood in its literal sense — to prove that the time 
is coming when the Son of God, now in the heavens, shall return to the earth 
in visible person, to dispossess all human governments of their power, secular 
and ecclesiastical, and establish himself in their stead as the universal ruler of 
mankind. Such a proposition will not commend itself to the generality of 
religious people, who are accustomed to look upon Christ exclusively as a 
"spiritual" deliverer — a Saviour of human souls from the guilt of sin — a 
means of individual ransom from a state of spiritual bondage. Such regard 
his mission as having culminated in his death, and attained completion in his 
resurrection and ascension; and restrict his action as the Messiah to his 
arbitrament of the spiritual affairs of the world ; to this therefore, they confine 
essential faith. All that men are required to believe, in order to saltation, is^ 
that Christ died for sin, and is now a High Priest and Mediator. Now, 
without in any degree seeking to detract from the importance of the sacrificial 
aspect of Christ's mission, we desire to show that the essential constituent of 
the Messiahship of Jesus Christ, and the most prominent element of his 
character, as pourtrayed in all the Scriptures, is his Kingship, and that therefore 
any faith which ignores this important phase of his character, is vitally 
defective, to which let every one see for himself, as a matter of the highest 
individual concern. 

There is a great deal more said in the Scriptures about the kingship of 
Christ than anything else. In the Old Testament, particularly, we find very 
little mention of the shame and the suffering to which he was to be subjected 
on account of sin. His sacrificial character is kept pretty much in the 
background That which stands out in brilliant prominence^ is the glory 
which is to cover the earth when he shall reign in righteousness. This is true 
also of the New Testament, though certainly it tells us more of " the man of 
sorrows and acquainted with grief" than the other. Every professed believer 
in Christ is prepared to admit that he is a king. It must be obvious, however^ 
that this admission is only valid in so far as it recvynizes the true idea of that 



232 

office. If a man say that Jesus is the Christ, or anointed one, while having an 
entirely erroneous idea of his character as such, his words are empty sound ; a 
verbal admission is of no value, when it does not express a proper apprehension 
of the thing admitted. Now, we shall find that the popular recognition of the 
kingship of Christ is of this worthless nature. It expresses a view which is 
essentially untrue, while it ignores the view exhibited in the Scriptures. By 
the kingship of Christ, it means the present exercise by him of a spiritual 
function in heaven; therefore, it is no recognition of Christ's Messiahship at 
all, in the true sense, as we shall presently see. 

It is admitted that the Jewish expectation of the Messiah was of the nature 
indicated at the commencement of the lecture, viz., that he should appear 
upon the earth in perse n, and visibly exercise the power of a king over ali 
nations; and it is also acmltted that the disciples themselves shared the same 
view. The real controveisy is as to the legitimacy of that view. Our religious 
teachers take upon themselves to say that it was an entirely mistaken one, of a 
gross and carnal nature. They severely condemn the idea of a visible kingdom 
on earth as opposed to the very spirit of Christianity, calling it Judaical, 
groveUing, "earthly, sensual, and devilish;" and as the teachers teach, so the 
people believe ; so that this sentiment in reference to the Jewish national hope 
and the expectation of the disciples, has passed into an unquestioned article of 
popular creed; and people look surprised and incredulous when they are 
gravely defended. Now let the merits of the case be candidly considered. 
"Were the expectations of the disciples erroneous and carnal ? If they were, 
how is it that they were not so stigmatized by Christ ? and how is it that none 
of the apostles made confession of the error in the epistles which some of them 
wrote subsequently to the time when they are supposed to have had their 
errors corrected ? "We have reason to suppose that Christ, who was never slow 
to rebuke his disciples when they were in fault, would have condemned this 
supposed essential mistake under which they were labouring; and Paul, who 
is so frank in his exposure of previous errors, would certainly not have omitted 
the greatest of them all. Those who affirm the misguidedness of the Jews and 
disciples in the belief in question, take upon themselves a serious responsibility; 
for their affirmation is without the slightest Scriptural foundation, except such 
as they may think is afforded by the general scope of Bible teaching. Nay, 
one may go farther, and declare that not only is there no Scriptural 
countenance for the popular condemnation, but that aU specific Scriptural 
testimony is directly in favour of the doctrine which it is so common to 
deprecate in terms of zealous severity. 

Jesus said to those who heard him, " I am not come to destroy the law and 
the prophets, lut to fulfil:'— {Ma^tt, v. 10.) Now with this statement in view, 



233 

we sliall look at a few of the statements of the prophets concerning him. We 
read in Micah v. 2. — 

"But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be Uttle among the thousands oi 
Judea, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me, that is to be RULER IN ISRAEL." 

Who came out of Bethlehem ? Jesns of Nazareth. Here then is a prophetic 
warrant for regarding him as the future '< ruler in Israel." 

"Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I wiU raise unto David a righteous 
branch, and a king shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and 
JUSTICE IN THE EAETH : in his days, Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell 
safely." — Jeremiah xxiii. 5, 6. 

What could be more calculated to inspire the Jewish national hope which is 
now so unctiously condemned? and what more likely to create the expectations 
which the disciples are condemned as "carnal" for entertaining ? Who is the 
Righteous Branch of David? None other than Jesus: for he claims the 
designation. He says, "I am the root and the offspring (or BRANCH: 
"offspring" being the antithesis to "root,") of David, and the bright and 
morning star." — (Rev. xxii. 16.) If Christ be the righteous branch raised up 
unto David, and be come to fuliil the law and the prophets, he must " reign^ 
and prosper^ and execute judgment and justice in the eaeth ;" for so the 
prophet hath declared the Righteous Branch shall do. The idea is not 
confined to one or two statements, but appears in the face of many testimonies, 
at a few of which we shall look. In Jeremiah xxxiii. 14, 15, we read — 

" Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will perform that good thing which 
I have promised unto the house of Israel, and to the house of Judah. In those days 
and at that time, will I cause the Branch of Righteousness to grow up unto David, 
and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land" 

"Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon 
his shoulder; and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God, 
the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government and 
peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David and upon his Kingdom, to 
order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth, even 
for ever. The zeal of the Lord of Hosts will perform this."— Isaiah ix. 6, 7. 

"Behold the man whose name is the BRANCH; and he shall grow up out of his 
place . . . and shall sit and rule upon his throne ; and he shall be a priest 
upon his throne." — Zech. vi. 12-13. 

"He shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people; and they shall 
beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks: 
nation shall not lift up sword against nation ; neither shall they learn war any more.'' 
—Isaiah ii. 4. 

" And the Lora shall be king over all the earth, in that day shall there be one Lord, 
and his name One."— Zech. xiv. 9. 

" Behold a king shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment."— 
Isaiah xxxii. 1. 



234 

^' The Lord of Hosts shall reign in Monnt Zion, and in Jerusalem, and hefore His 
ancients gloriously.'' — Isaiah xxiv. 24. 

" The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover thfe sex. 
And in that day there shall le a root of Jesse^ which shall stand for an ensign of the 
people; to it shall the Gentiles seek, and his rest shall he glorious.'' — Isaiah xi. 9, 10. 

** Cry out and shout, thou inhabitant of Zion ; for great is the Holy One of Israel in 
the midst of thee." — Isaiah xii. 6. 

'*I will make them (the Jews) one nation in the land upon the mountains of Israel; 
and one King shall he King to them all." — Ezekiel xxxvii. 22. 

"*• The Lord hath sworn in truth unto David ; He will not turn from it ; of the fruit 
of thy hody will I set upon thy throne." — Psalm exxxii. 11. 

" The Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou on my right hand until I make thine 
enemies thy footstool. The Lord shall send the rod of thy strength out of Zion. Rule 
thou in the midst of thine enemies." — Psalm ex. 1, 2. 

" I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of 
the earth for thy possession." — Psalm ii. 8. 

" Be shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of 
the earth. Yea, all kings shall fall down before him ; all nations shall serve him.' — 
Psalm Ixxii. 8, 11. (See also Dan. vii. 14.) 

These are a few out of many testimonies of a common import, and the 
question for us to consider is whether they do not amply justify the 
expectations which the Jews are admitted to have built on them. Nay, could 
they have consistently professed a belief in such testimonies, and not have 
entertained such expectations ? It is not possible to conceive of language more 
designedly adapted to express the one idea of Christ's visible manifestation as 
a king on earth ; and if the Jews were wrong in looking for such a manifesta- 
tion, it was no fault of theirs. It was not because they were carnally minded; 
but because the language of the holy men of old, who spoke as they were 
moved by the Holy Si^irit, was so framed as to preclude every other but the 
one idea which they derived from it. But were they wrong ? '\\rho wiU dare 
to say they were, in the face of such an accumulation of explicit testimony to 
the contrary ? Many dare the responsible venture, under the influence of 
perverted impressions, and thus unfittingly contradict the words of God's holy 
prophets, and give the lie to the Lord Jesus himself, who said he came to 
fulfil their word. 

It may be suggested that New Testament interpretation throws another 
light upon the statements of the Old Testament, and deprives them of the 
warranty which they seem to afford to the Jewish doctrine of the Messiah's 
kingship. It is customary to assume that this is the case; but the result of 
an examination will prove that a more unfounded assumption could not be, 
and that the N-ew Testament xinmistakably corrobora/t«s the teaching of the 



235 

prophets on tlie subject. We are met on the very threshold of the enquiry oy 
the message delivered by the angel Gabriel to Mary, in announcing the birth 
'of Christ. 

" And behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shait 
call his nam« Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the 
Highest ; and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David ; and he 
shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever ; and of his kingdom there shall he no end." 
—Luke i. 31-33. 

Here is a distinct New Testament intimation that it is the purpose of God 
to give to Jesus *^ the throne of his father David." If we would apprehend 
the import of the statement, we must know what is the throne of David. Of 
David, we know something. He was the most renowned of Israel's God- 
anointed kings, holding sway over the twelve tribes of Israel in the Holy 
Xand, and ruling many tributary nations. He was a mighty warrior, a 
►distinguished prophet, and a poet of the highest type. He was the progenitor 
of Christ, through Mary, who was descended from the royal house ; and was a 
fitting type of his illustrious son, whom he acknowledged as "My Lord." — 
(Matt. xxii. 43.) But what of his throne ? Peter said, in his address to the 
Jews, on the day of Pentecost — 

" Therefore, being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath tp 
him that of the fruit of his (Davids) loins according to the flesh, he would raise up 
Christ TO SIT UPON HIS THRONE.' —Acts ii. 30. 

There is, therefore, a connection between Christ's mission and David's 
throne. Had David a throne ? He had. In what did it consist ? Not in the 
material structure which he occupied as a seat in dispensing justice ; that has 
long ago crumbled into dust, and we cannot suppose that such a trivial thing 
would be made the subject of divine promises. The throne of a kingdom is 
not the literal seat occupied by royalty on state occasions. When we speak of 
the throne of England, we mean the office or position of monarch in this 
country. Hence, we believe that the Prince of Wales wiU, when he succeeds 
his royal mother, ascend the throne of England in a real sense, although the 
chair of state may have been changed many times in the course of generations. 
The word "throne" seems to have been borrowed from the royal seat, and 
enlarged to cover the tojsI position. So with the throne of David; it is said 
of Solomon, on the occasion of his accession in the room of David, (1st Ivings 
ii. 12), "Then sat Solomon on the throne of David his father.'' Yet we read 
in 1st Kings x. 18, that "he made a great throne of ivory, and overlaid it \^dth 
the best gold," so that while sitting on the throne of David his father in tlie 
political sense, Solomon really occupied a different royal seat. Hence, the 
"^throne of David" cannot mean the piece of royal furnitui'O which ha<i 



236 

disappeared even long before the first advent of Christ ; it must mean the 
position of David as king of the Jews and chief potentate of the earth. Let 
those who dissent from this conclusion set themselves to find another. Let 
them eschew fanciful interpretation which is at all times unsafe, and tie 
themselves by the grammatical rules of the case. "The throne of David" 
points to something that pe7'tained to SauVs successor. There is no getting 
away from this ; and any explanation of the promise that ignores this as its 
fimdamental element, must be rejected as unworthy. Of this character is the 
view that Christ is now on David's throne. Christ is in heaven, and cannot 
now be sitting on that throne ; for nothing that David ever possessed is rn 
heaven. Not even himseK has gone there ; for Peter said in his address on the 
day of Pentecost, (Acts ii. 34,) " DsLvid. IS NOT ASCENDED INTO THE 
HEAVENS." When the time arrives, the throne of David wiU be developed 
in the earth ; and Jesus will share it with his faithful ones, as intimated in 
(Eev. ui. 21.) That time he spake of when on earth. He said (Matt. xxv. 31,) 
" When the Son of Man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with 
him, THEN shall he sit upon the throne of his glory." Hence, before Jesus 
sits upon David's throne, he will return to earth, appear in Palestine, and 
assume the position which David occupied when he swayed the sceptre of 
Israel; that is, he will become king of the Jews. 

For corroboration, we look at Ezekiel xxi. 25-27. The prophet was sent to 
Zedekiah, an unworthy prince, who was the last to occupy David'B throne. He 
was sent to tell him of coming retribution, and in the course of his prophecy 
he uttered the following words: — 

And thon profane, wicked prince of Israel, Tvhose day is come when iniquity 
shall have an end ; thus saith the Lord of Hosts, Remove the diadem and take off 
the crown ; this shall not te tht same; exalt the low, and abise the high ; I will 
overturn, overturn, overturn it ; and it shall he no more until HE COME WHOSE 
RIGHT IT IS ; and I will give it him." 

Here was a diadem to be removed, a crown to be taken off, and a national 
polity to be completely abolished, as indicated in the triple repetition of 
the verb, "overturn," and as expressed by the phrase, " it shall be no more." 
The prediction related to things Jewish, even to the things which constitute 
the throne of David; and its fulfilment is notorious to every reader of Jewish 
history. About a year after its delivery, Zedekiah was uncrowned by 
Nebuchadnezzar. The nobles were put to death; the nation was partly 
massacred, and partly carried away captive, and the land was given over to 
desolation. Seventy years after, a partial restoration took place under Ezra 
and Nehemiah, but not of the throne of David. The Jews existed as a vassal 
people thenceforward; and after varied political fortunes, were overtaken by a 



237 

storm -whicli swept away every vestige of their national existence. • The 
Eomans nnder Vespasian, invaded the country, and subdued its fortified places ; 
and Vespasian having transferred the command to Titus, the latter laid siege 
to Jerusalem, which at that time was crowded with people from all parts of 
the country. The details of that awful siege are familiar to every one. The 
city was tediously beleaguered for months; famine arose among the inhabitants; 
civil dissensions divided their counsels, and led to mutual slaughter; and, 
finally, the place was sacked and given to the flames, and upwards of 
1,000,000 of Jews perished. The remainder were sold as slaves, and scattered 
throughout the Roman empire as fugitives ; and scattered they remain to this 
day. So awfully has the prophecy been fulfilled, that, for the last twenty 
centuries, the throne of David has been a mere idle phrase— a tradition of the 
past ; his kingdom has been overthrown, his land in desolation, and his people 
wandering as homeless exiles, unpitied and unpitying. But is this condition 
of David's throne to be perpetual? Are the Gentiles for ever to exalt their 
proud horns over the fallen kingdom of the Lord ? (See 1 Chron. xxix, 23 ; 2 
Chron. ix. 8 ; xiii. 8 ; which af&rm the kingdom of Israel to have been the 
kingdom of G-od.) Nay, saith the prophecy: desolation shall only continue 
UNTIL— until what? " Until HE COME whose right it is^ Who is this ? 
None other than Jesus Christ, to whom the throne pertains of right, both by 
lineal descent, and special divine bequest. Observe, then, what is distinctly 
proved, that the things overturned ai^e the things to be given to Christ at his 
coming. Now, what things were those? The diadem, crown, throne, and 
kingdom of David, which were so profanely desecrated by the wicked Zedekiah. 
Hence, when HE COMES whose right they are, he will enter into their 
possession in as real a sense as they were held by Zedekiah. He will become 
King of the Jews, and Lord of the whole earth. We thus perceive a striking 
significance in the words of the angel: — 

"The Lord God shall give unto Jesus the throne of Ms father David; and he shall 
reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.^' 

Going a step farther in our New Testament enquiry, we come to the birth of 
Christ, and we note the following confirmatory incident : — 

" Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days 3f Herod the king, 
behold there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem, saying, Where is he that is 
born King of the Jews ? " — Matt. ii. 1. 

The enquiry of the wise men was quite intelligible in view of all that tlie 
prophets had foretold of him who was to be ruler in Israel; but if Christ is oulg 
the spiritual Saviour of mankind, in a universal general sense, their words havo 
no meaning. In what sense could Christ be "king of the Jcavs," if he only 
stood in broad spiritual relationship to the human race as a whole? It may bo 



238 

«ugge?£ecl tliat he is king of spii'itual Jews, who are not Jews outwardly, but 
in the heart. The reply to this is, that Christ is not king of his own people. 
Of them, he says "/ call yon not servants^ hut friends^ They are his hretlu^en^ 
*' joint heirs with Christ" (Rom. viii. 17), destiued to reign n'ith him a thousand 
years (Rev. xx. 6). They are not his subjects, but aggregately his bride, ''the 
Lamb's wife" — signifying the closest communion and identity of relational 
interests Christ, therefore, cannot be king of the Jews in any spiritual sense. 
He is king of those Jews of whom David was king ; for he is heir to his throne. 
That this was the nature of his claim, as understood by his contemporaries, 
is obvious from what followed the enquiry of the wise men: — 

"When Herod the king had heard these things, he was troubled, and all Jern- 
salem with him. And when he had gathered all the chief priests and scribes of the 
X)eople together, he demanded of them where Christ should be born. And they said 
unto him, In Bethlehem of Judea; for thus it is -written by the prophet — And thou 
Bethlehem, in the land of Juda, art not the least among the princes of Juda ; for out 
<of thee shall come a Governor that shall rule my people Israel. . . . And 

(Herod) sent forth and slew all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts 
thereof, from two years old and under, according to the time which he had diligently- 
enquired of the wise men." — Matt. ii. 2, 3, 6, 16. 

Now whence all this commotion ? If Christ was merely to be a spiritual 
i-uler, in the popular sense — exercising power from heaven in the hearts of men, 
witiiout at all interfering with the temporal concerns of kings on earth, it is 
iiot conceivable that Herod should have been so jealous of him ; because 
Christ's spiritual dominion would not in any way have conflicted with Herod's 
secular function as a king. Assuming, however, that the enquiry of the wise 
men imported the verity of Christ's character as a king, appointed of God to 
sit an David's throne, Herod's procedure appears in a natural light. He was 
^t that time ruler in Israel. He was, in fact, "king of the Jews," in the name 
of the Roman Csesar, For him, therefore, to hear of the birth of a rival to that 
position, was to be touched in the tenderest part, and to have all his jealousy 
aroused. He would see plainly that if he allowed this infant king to live, the 
people's allegiance might become diverted, and his own throne would be 
endangered. He therefore conceived the inhuman project of slaughtering the 
entire babyhood of Bethlehem, in the hope of destroying the object of his 
jealousy — a proof that he recognized in. Christ a prospective claimant of the 
literal kingship of Israel. 

If we trace the career and note the sayings of Christ, as further recorded, we 
shall find the same uniform indications of the correctness of the view enter- 
tained by the apostles concerning his kingship. For instance, in the course of 
liis sermon on the mount, he said "Swear not by Jerusalem, for it is the city of 
tke Great Ein^^" 2s ow it would be difficult to ^attacli ^ lik« significance to 



J 



239 

these words, were the popular view correct. If Christ is never to return ta 
earth again, except for the purpose of plunging it in the "judgment fires," and 
blotting every vestige of its existence from creation, what possible connection 
can exist between him and the city which witnessed his humiliation, since in 
that case it must perish in the universal destruction ? In the passage before 
us, Jesus affirms a connection with it, and accounts that connection so sacred, 
that he prohibits us from using the name of the city on oath. He is "the G-reat 
Eang," — ^the "greater than Solomon." Jerusalem is the city. It existed at 
the time that Christ uttered the words under consideration ; only, in the time 
of Christ, it was a great, prosperous, and magnificent centre of royalty and 
learning, whereas, now it is an insignificant abomination-infested, and com- 
paratively ruinous and neglected town in the heart of a petty Turkish 
province. Divine regard, however, is no less now than ever it was. The 
testimony is, "I have graven thee upon the palms of my hands : thy walls are 
continually before me." — (Isa. xlix. 16.) For a period it has been in desolatiouo 
This was predicted by the Lord Jesus. He said — 

" They (the Jews) shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be led away captive 
into all nations ; and Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles^ UNTIL the times 
of the Gentiles be fulfilled." — Luke xxi. 24 

He also said (with tears in his eyes) — 

" Jerusalem, Jerusalem, that killest the prophets, and stonest them which ar© 
sent unto thee ; how often would I have gathered thy children together even as a hen 
gathereth her brood under her wings, and ye would not. Behold, your house is left 
unto you desolate, for I say unto you, ye shall not see me henceforth UNTIL THE 
TIME COME lohen ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord." — 
Matt, xxiii. a7-o9 ; Luke xiii. 34, 35. 

Here was a treading down and a desolating foretold. That thJs referred to 
Jerusalem in Palestine is universally granted. Let it be noted then, that the 
place involved in the prediction of ruin, is the same which is related to the 
" UNTIL ' ' by which that prediction is limited. If Jerusalem has been trodden 
down of the Gentiles, and left " desolate," she will as certainly, by the same 
prediction, recover from her fall when the period indicated by the word "until" 
arrives. In one case, " until " arrives with the expiration of " the times of the 
Gentiles;" in the other, when the time comes that the Jewish nation will 
recognize the crucified Jesus as the name-bearer of God, The declaration is, . 
that at that time., desolation and down-treading shall cease. Now both events 
are certain. The termination of the times of the Gentiles, or the age of 
Gentile domjnation is decreed (Dan. vii. 2o-27 ; ix. 24-27 ; Rom. xi. 2.5), and 
we are informed, in the following testimony, that the day is coming wh-tm 
CJhrist will yet be received by his jjenitent nation, the Jews 4 — 



240 

'*1 ■will pour npon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jeru* 
Balem, the spirit of grace and of supplications ; and they shall look upon me whom 
they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for an only son, and shall 
he in bitterness for him as one that is in bitterness for his first-born." — Zech. xii. 10. 

"When these have been accomplished, what then for Jerusalem? Let the 
following testimonies give the answer: — 

" The Lord shall inherit Judah, his portion in the Holy Land, and shall choose 
Jerusalem again.'^ — Zech. ii. 12. 

"The Lord shall comfort Zion: He will comfort all her waste places; 
and He will make her wilderness like Eden, and her desert like the garden of 
the Lord ; joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving and the voice of 
melody." — Isaiah li. 3. 

*' Awake ! awake 1 stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand 
of the Lord the cup of His fury. Thou hast drunken the dregs of the cup of 
trembling, and wrung them out. . . Therefore, hear now this, thou afflicted and 
drunken, but not with wine: Thus saith the Lord, thy Lord, and thy God that 
pleadeth the cause of His people. Behold I have taken out of thine hand the cup of 
trembling, even the dregs of the cup of my fury. Thou shalt no more drink it again.'* 
Isaiah li. 17, 21, 22. 

" Awake I awake ! put on thy strength, O Zion ; put on thy beautiful garments, O 
Jerusalem, the holy city ; for henceforth there shall no more come into thee the uncir- 
cumcised and the unclean. . , Break forth into joy, sing together, ye waste places 
of Jerusalem ; for the Lord hath comforted His people, He hath redeemed Jerusalem.'* 
— Isaiah lii. 1, 9. 

" The Lord of Hosts shall reign in Mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and before His 
ancients gloriously." — Isaiah xxiv. 23. 

" At that time they shall call Jerusalem the throne of the Lord, and all the 
nations shall be gathered unto it, to the name of the Lord, to Jerusalem. Neither 
shall they walk any more after the imagination of their evil heart." — Jeremiah 
iii. 17. 

" For the laio shall go forth of Zion, and the tcord of the Lord from Jerusalem ; 
and he shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off; and 
they shall beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears into pruning hooks ; 
npvtion shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more." 
— Micah iv. 2, 3. 

Here then we learn that the city of Jerusalem has an important place in 

the purpose of God. It is destined to be the seat of that divine government 

which is to bless the world in the future age. It will, in fact, be the capital 

of the coming universal kingdom, constituting the centre of power, of law, 

of enlightenment, for the gladsome nations who will repair thither for 

instruction in that glorious age ; for it is written — 

" And many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain 
of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, and He will teach us of His ways, and tee 
icill walk in His paths ; for out of Zion shall go forth the law, arid theivord of the Lorc^ 
from Jerusalem.''— Isaiah ii. 3. 



241 

This going-up of nations will be periodical, as we learn from Zech. xiv. 13. 

" And it shall come to pass that every one that is left of all the nations which came 
against Jerusalem, shall even go up /rom year to year to worship the King, the Lord 
of Hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles."— 

If any nation become refractory, and refuse to pay this annual homage to 
the king of all the earth, they will be summarily dealt with. No need for 
-armies and lazy process of military subjugation : a word from the King will 
stay the supplies of heaven, and compel submission. It is written — verse 
17— 

** And it shall be that whoso shall not come up of all the families of the earth unto 
Jerusalem, to worship the King, the Lord of Hosts, even upon them shall be no rain." 

Now the Lord Jesus was aware of this glorious destiny in store for the city 
of Jerusalem, and well knew the intimate relationship he should sustain to it 
when the time should come when his countrymen would say to him "Blessed 
is he that cometh in the name of the Lord ; " and, with this on his mind, he 
could say with an appropriateness which can only be appreciated by those 
who understand the purposes of God — " Swear not by Jerusalem, for it is the 
city of the Great King." She is the city of the Great 'King, though now but 
a despised ruin ; and those who laugh at the promises of her future glory, are 
guilty of a heinous crime against God, for which they may be called upon to 
answer. The Great King would not allow His friends to swear by her name : 
much less will he forbear the jibe of the scornful. He cometh to his city anon 
to rule the world in righteousness, and woe be to the despiser ; but blessed are 
all they who are looking for redemption in Jerusalem. — (Luke ii. 38.) To 
them the words of the prophet are addressed : — 

" Eejoice ye with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, all ye that love her. Bejoice for 
30y with her all ye that mourn for her; that ye may suck and be satisfied with the 
breasts of her consolations ; that ye may milk out, and be delighted with the 
abundance of her glory.'' — Isaiah Ixvi. 10, 11. 

Thus, by a natural process of reasoning, we are enabled to extract from the 
words of Christ in his "sermon on the mount,' - evidence of a powerful kind of the 
reality of his Idngship in relation to the earth. Nathaniel the " Israelite 
indeed, in whom there was no guile," adds to that evidence in the recog-nition 
of Christ to which he gave utterance on meeting him ; (John i. 49) " Rabbi, 
thou art the Son of God ; thou art the King of Israeli That the conviction 
expressed in these words was generally impressed on the minds of the people 
by the teaching of Christ, is evident from the fact that " they wanted to take 
him by force, and make him a king." — (Jolm vi. 15.) Their language, on the 
occasion of his triumphant entry into Jerusalem, is evidence to the same point: — 
^* Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord ! Blessed he the himjdom of 



242 

mir father David that Cometh in the name of the Lord'' — (Mark xi. 10.) Christ. 
gave them reason for that conviction in the parable of the vineyard, contained 
in Luke xx., beginning at the 9th verse. The vineyard, says Jesus, was planted 
by a certain nobleman, and let out to husbandmen ; and at the time of the fruit, 
the nobleman sent his servants to the husbandmen to get of the fruits of the 
vineyard ; but they maltreated and killed them one after another (verse 13). 
*•' Then said the Lord of the vineyard, what shall I do ? I wiU send my beloved 
son : it may be that they will reverence him when they see him ; but when the 
husbandmen saw him, they reasoned among themselves, sayings This is the 
Heie; come let us kiU him, and the inheritance shall be ours. So they cast him 
out of the vineyard, and killed him." This parable related to the nation of 
Israel, and the rulers thereof. This is evident from the 19th verse, and also, 
from a statement in Isaiah v. 7 — " The vineyard of the Lord of Hosts is th& 
House of Israel." This being so, let us note the tendency of its teaching. In 
the rejected servants, we recognize the prophets who shared the fate indicated 
in the words of Christ — " O Jerusalem, that killest the prophets, and stonest 
them that are sent u7ito thee." The "Son" was the Lord Jesus Christ, as is 
evident from the words of Paul in Heb. i. 2, which might be almost accepted 
as a commentary upon the parable under consideration, — " God, who at sundry 
times, and in divers manners, spake in times past unto our fathers hi/ the 
2)rophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us hy His Son." If Christ, then, 
be the "son" of the parable, of necessity he is also the '■'•heir" — Of what? 
This is the important point. Answer : Of the inheritance held hy the hnsba^idmen; 
for said they, " Tliis is the heir, come let us kill him, and the inheritance shall 
be ours." Now, if that inheritance be the land and nation of the Jews, of 
which the Pharisees were the rulers or "husbandmen," and Christ be the heir 
of these things, there is no escape from the conclusion sought to be established 
throughout this lecture. He is the rightful claimant to David's throne. " He 
came nnio his own and his oovn received him not.'^ — (John i. 11.) Why did 
they receive him not ? What motive prompted tho chief priests and the rulers 
to destroy Jesus ? It was not merely their hatred of righteousness. If Christ 
had simply been a teacher of religion, according to modem notions, doubtless 
they would have been among his admirers ; but then he was "the heir." He wa» 
the di\T.nely sent of God to occupy David's throne, and put down all opposing 
authority andpower; and his assertion of this character brought him into instant 
collision with them, because they had the inheritance in their possession. 
Therefore, said they, in their insensate short-sighted jealousy, — " Come, let us 
kill liim, and the inheritance shall be ours." So they plotted his destruction, 
and succeeded in their nefarious plans. They brought him before Pilate, who, 
finding no fault in him, was willing to release him. — (Luke xxiii. 13-16.) This 



243 

inflamed tlieir animosity, and developed the true nature of its origin. Tliey 
cried out saying-, — "If thou let this man go, thou art not Cassar's friend i 
whosoever maketh liimself a eing, speaketh ag-ainst Csesar." — (John xix. 12.) 
This had the desired effect : Pilate gave judgment ; and Christ was crucified, 
and according to the Eoman custom, the nature of the charge against him was 
specified in writing over the cross : " Jesus of JSazareth, THE KING- OF 
THE JEWS." — (John xix. 19.) Here again the kingship of Christ came out 
in circumstantial prominence. He was crucified because he " made himself a 
king/' This is the declaration of the superscription. That superscription was 
not sufficiently definite for the chief priests. We read, (John xix. 20, 21,) 
*' This title then read many of the Jews , . ^ Then said the chief 
priests of the Jews to Pilate, write not The King of the Jews, but that HE 
SAID, I am the King of the Jews." Here is an important testimony fromtho 
chief priests as to Christ's own assertion of his royalty. In fact the closing 
scenes of our Lord's life on earth, altogether constitute the most decisive proof 
that prospective Jewish royalty was the essential feature of his character as 
the Messiah, — a feature which is entirely omitted in popular preaching. 
The teaching of the Apostles after our Lord's ascension was the same on 
this important point. We read that the Jews of Thessalonica accused them 
to the rulers of the city after this fashion : — 

" These that have turned the world upside down, are come hither also, whom Jason, 
hath received; and these all do contrary to the decrees of Caesar, saying that 
THERE IS ANOTHER KiNG, ONE JESUS."— (Acts xvii. 6, 7.) 

Paul made the same proclamation to the Athenians, in his address on Mars 
Hill, recorded in Acts xvii. 30, 31 ; — 

" And the time of this ignorance God winked at, but now commandeth all men 
everywhere to repent, because He hath appointed a day in which He will judge (or rule) 
the world in righteousness by tpiat man whom he hath ordained, whereof no hath 
■ given all men assurance, in that He hath raised him from the dead." 

In fact, the great burthen of the New Testament teaching concerning Jesus 
is, that he is ^^tJie Christ,'' that is, the Anointed One foretold by the prophets as 
the future king of the world. If you deny to him this kingship, you deny that 
he is the Christ — for the anointing refers, not only to his character as "the Lamb 
of God taking away the sin of the world," but to his future development as 
Grod's viceg'erent on earth. His "Christing" is prospective, culminating in 
"the glory that shall be revealed," which shall "cover the earth as the 
waters cover the sea." Whosoever, therefore, is ignorant of this, and denies 
the future manifested Christship of Jesus, cannot Scripturnlly or acceptably 
confess that he is the Christ, inasmuch as that confession is empty sound wlior: 
it does not import the things signified. 



244 

That Christ is the future king of the world is one of the most gladsome 
truths of revelation. What hope else is there for this sin-afflicted world ? It 
has gi'oaned under ages of mis-rule. The best interests of its people have been 
fcacrificed to the whims and passions of grasping potentates. Selfishness 
concentred in the few has created suffering for the many. "War has drenched 
the soil with blood for many generations, and the burden of its cost has been 
saddled upon the people, curtailing their means of subsistence, and depriving 
them of the opportunity of true human life, by condemning them to a life of 
incessant toil. The legislation of centuries has failed to construct a sound 
social system. The riches of the earth are hoarded away in the halls of a 
surfeited few, and the great mass of humanity are left to welter out a degraded 
existence of poverty, ignorance, and misery. God's goodness has been 
fraudulently squandered. The provision sufficient for competence to all who 
breathe this mundane atmosphere, has been rapaciously plundered by the 
unprincipled and the strong, and stored away in accursed garners from 
famishing millions. This is as true in the present nineteenth century of 
civilization as it was in the ruthless days of yore : only the system — venerable 
by its antiquity — ^is more respectable, has the protection of the law, and is 
recognized as the indispensable institution of a well-governed country. And 
among the people themselves, what perversion we behold! How intel- 
lectually barren I how morally destitute ! how ignoble and selfish ! how small 
and grovelling, and contemptible ! "What a mass of worthless rubbish do they 
present ! V'erily the world is in a bad state. It is afflicted with a foul 
disease. It is oppressed with a terrible nightmare. This is the age of 
disorder, moral obliquity, and many-headed wrong. Some say the world is 
getting better. It is a mistake. Intellectual acuteness is on the increase ; 
but real character is dwarfing with the increase of years. Mankind is 
deteriorating with the spread of civilization. Flimsiness and frivolity are the 
order of the day. Thorough-going good sense and earnestness of moral 
inirpose are confined to a despised minority. The word of God is of light 
esteem, and faith hath almost vanished from the earth. "Where shall we find 
comfort for the future ? To human effort we look in vain. Temperance 
and Missionary Societies, Mechanics' Institutes, pulpit ministrations, and all 
the variety of ameliorating agencies, so active in the present century, are 
impotent for the task of reform. It is a delusion to suppose that they 
are going to bring about the millennium. The world is incurable by 
human agency. Its only hope lies in the truth expressed in the title 
of this lecture. A great Deliverer is waiting the appoiuted time of 
blessing ; Christ at God's right hand is the future king of the world; he who 
enduied the shame of a malefactor's- cross is coming to wear the honour of a 



245 

universal crown ; and though dark be the clouds that will usher in his august 
advent, and fierce the convulsions that will attend the earth's deliverance, yet 
bright will be the glory that will afterwards cover the earth, and peaceful 
the repose that will settle on its everlasting hills. 



LECTURE VIII. (a.) 



TSE COVENANT 3IAEE WITH EAVIB REALISED IN THE 
RE-ESTABLISHMENT OF THE KINGDOM OE ISRAEL UNDER CHRIST. 

We have seen that "the promises made unto the fathers" in remote Old 
Testament times, form the groundwork of the scheme which Grod is developing 
through Christ. Of these, orthodox religion takes no cognizance. "VYho ever 
hears of them in modem sermons, or religious tuition of any kind? "We now 
propose to consider another matter, having an equally essential reference to 
the scheme, and of which there is a similar entire absence in all systems of 
modern religion. We refer to the covenant made with David, which may be 
considered in the light of a clause in the greater covenant established with 
the fathers, settling an important matter of detail which is covered by, but not 
expressed in, the older general promises on w^hich the whole scheme of God's 
purposed goodness towards mankind rests. 

The fact that G-od made a covenant with David, having reference to Clirijjt, 
is placed beyond all doubt by the statement of Peter, on the day of Pentecost: — 

" Therefore * . being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn 

with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins according to the flesh IIE WOULD 
RAISE UP CIIiilbT to sit on His throne:'— Acts ii. 30. 

Preliminary to a consideration of the subject, we invite attention to the 
following further allusions to the oath referred to by Peter — 

" I have made a covenant with my chosen ; I have sworn unto David my servant, 
Thy seed will I establish for ever, and build up thy throne to all generations."— 
Psalm Ixxxix. 3, 4. 

" The Lord hath sworn in truth unto David ; He will not turn from it ; Of the fruit of 
thy body will I set upon thy throne."— Psalm cxxxii. IL 



246 

'■' Mij covenant ivill I not break, nor alter the thing that is goaS' out of my lips.. 
Once have I sworn by my holiness, that I will not lie unto David. His seed shall 
endure for ever, and his throne as the sun before me."— Psalm Ixxxix. 34-36. 

" Of this man's (David) seed hath God accordikq to his promise, raised unto 
Israel a Saviour, Jesus." — Acts xiii. 23. 

"And hath raised up an horn of salvation for us in the hottse of his servant 
David, as He spake by the viouth cf his holy prophets, which have been since the world 
began." — Luke i. 69, 70. 

These quotations of Scripture establish the fact — 1st, that G-od entered into 
some pledge or undertaking with David, king of Israel, to uphold His kingdom 
in an unlimited future ; and, 2nd, that the pledge,, covenant, or oath had 
reference to Jesus. David's "last words" (2 Sam. xxiii. 1-7,) confirm this 
conclusion: — " He hath made with 3IE an eyerlastixg covenant, ordered in 
all things and sure, foi- tJm is all my salvation and all my desire,''* The 
indentity of this covenant with that referred to in the Scriptures quoted above, 
is evident from the immediate context: — 

" The Spirit of the Lord spake by me, and his word was in my tongue. The God of 
Israel said, the Eock of Israel spake to me; He that ruleth ovERiyiiN must be just, 
ruling in the fear of God. And he shall he as the light of the morning when the sun 
risethy even a morning without clouds ; as the tender grass springing out of the earth 
by clear shining, after rain." Although my house be not so with God, yet — " 

Then follows the declaration first quoted. 

David was an old man when he penned these words hy the spirit^ and it is 
evident that, to the mind of the spirit, the covenant was not realized in the- 
state of things iDrevailing at the time. Solomon, a young man of promise, was, 
about to ascend the throne, but it is evident at a glance that this is not the 
event contemplated. The spirit in Da\T.d points forward to a period when it. 
would be fulfilled in the rule of one who should rise upon the world, like a 
morning without clouds ; and when "all David's salvation and all his desire," 
would be accomplished in connection with that great event. This did not. 
come to pass in Da\id's day. We have the testimony of the words immediately 
succeeding those quoted. David's house was not at that time in the position^ 
guaranteed by the promise:- " Although my house ee not so with God, yet he 
hath made with me an everlasting covenant," &c. Solomon's reign was, 
doubtless, the meridian of Israel's glory ; but it was not a morning without 
cloud — it was not the realization of the covenant. Solomon sinned and led 
Israel astray, and ultimately dealt injustice to the nation. David's salvation 
was not in any sense secured in Solomon's achievements. Contrariwise, his 
crown was tarnished and his kingdom rent, through the perversion of a son. 
who departed from God, multiplied wives, and turned aside to the worship of 
heathen gods. His very name was brought into abhorrence with the bulk of 



247 

the nation, through the oppressions of one who falsified the expectations 

created by the commencement of his royal career a& the wisest of men. It was 

not to such a future that "the last (spirit) words of David" had. reference as 

the consummation of '' the everlasting covenant" in all David's salvation and 

all his desire. There was visible to the mind of the spirit, in the dim distance^ 

far beyond the days of Solomon, the form of one whose name should endure 

for ever — who should descend like the gentle rain upon the new-mo^Ti grass^ 

diffusing life and fragrance, in whom men should be blest all the world over^ 

(Psalm Ixxii, 17,) who, while the destroyer of the wicked, the conqueror of 

kings, the avenger of injustice, should be a refuge for the poor, a shadow 

from the heat, a hiding place from the wind, a covert from the tempest, and 

rivers of water in a dry place. — (Isaiah xi. 32.) 

Let us now look at the covenant itself. We cannot do better than quote 

entire that passage in the history of David in which it occurs : — 

" And it came to pass, when the king sat in liis house, and the Lord had given him 
rest round about from all his enemies, that the king said unto Nathan the prophet, 
See now, I dwell in a house of cedar, but the ark of God dwelleth within curtains. 
And Nathan said unto the king, Go, do all that is in thine heart ; for the Lord is with 
thee. And it came to pass that night, that the word of the Lord came unto Nathan, 
saying, Go, and tell my servant David, thus saith the Lord, Shalt thou build me a 
house for me to dwell in ? Whereas I have not dwelt in any house since the time that I 
brought up the children of Israel out of Egypt, even to this, day, but have walked in a 
tent and in a tabernacle. In all the places wherein I have walked with all the children 
of Israel, spake I a word with any of the tribes of Israel, whom I commanded to feed 
my people Israel, saying, Why build me ye not a house of cedar ? Now, therefore, so 
shalt thou say unto my servant David,, thus saith the Lord of Hosts, I took thee from 
the sheepcote, from following the sheep,to be ruler over my people, over Israel: and I was 
with thee withsrsoever thou wentest^ and have cut oif all thine enemies out of thy 
sight, and have made thee a great name, like unto the name of the great men that 
are in the earth. Moreover I will appoint a place for my people Israel, and wiU plant 
them that they may dwell in a place of their own, and move no more ; neither shall 
the children of wickedness afflict them any more, as before time ; and as since the 
time that I commanded Judges to be over my people Israel, and have caused thee to- 
rest from all thine enemies. Also the Lord telleth thee that He will make thee a, 
house. And when thy days be fulfilled, and thou shalt sleep with thy fathers, I will 
set up thy seed after thee which shall proceed out of thy bowels, and I will establish 
his kingdom. He shall build up a house for my name, and I wiU establish the throne 
of his kingdom for ever. I will be his father and he shall be my son. If he commit 
iniquity, I will chasten him with the i-od of men, and with the stripes of the children 
of men. But my mercy shall not depart away from him, as I took it from Saul, whom 
I put away before thee. And thine house and thy kingdom shall be established for 
ever before thee : thy throne shall be established for ever."— 2 Sam vii. 1-10. 

Now before proceeding to elucidate the significance of these words as 
applicable to Christ, it will be well to meet a preliminary objection which is 
sometimes urged with considerable force, viz., that as they Avere fulfilled 
ixi the veign of Solomon, they cannot be legitimately undoratood of Christ. 



248 

Tbat the things affirmed had a parallel in the events of Solomon's reign 
cannot be denied. Both David and Solomon apply them in this way (see 1 
Kings V. 5; viii. 20; xi. 38; 1 Chron. xxii. 7; xxviii. 3.) Solomon was 
Da\'id'8 son; God, in a sense, was his Father, for He took him under His 
special care, and endowed him with a degree of wisdom that made him 
famous above kings; he sat on the throne of David "before " (that is, in the 
presence of) David, being elevated to the crown before David's decease, by 
David's own instructions, and continued king after David was gathered to his 
fathers; he built the temple of G-od at Jerusalem, according to plans drawn 
out by David under the rofluence of inspiration (1 Chron. xxviii. 12, 19) ; he 
was a man of peace ; he committed iniquity and was chastened in the divine 
displeasure by means of adversaries raised up toward the close of his reign ; 
but God's mercy did not depart away from him as it did from Saul, for he 
was allowed to reign till death removed him. To this extent, the covenant 
with David was verified in the days of Solomon ; but to say that this parallel 
was the substance of the things promised, is to go in the teeth of Scripture 
testimony, both Old and New. David and Solomon's application of the 
covenant, as recorded in the Scriptures referred to, does not interfere with 
this testimony. David and Solomon may be presumed not to have known its 
full scope. The prophets generally did not understand the full effect of their 
words. — (2 Peter i. 20-21.) Paul applies the terms of the covenant to Christ, ia 
Heb. i. 5 : "I will be to him a father, and he shall be to me a son." Peter, 
as we have already seen, expressly says that the covenant had reference to him. 
— (Acts ii. 30.) Jesus applies David's language to himseK : "The Lord said 
unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy foot- 
stool" (Psalm ex. 1); and furthermore, he says of himself "I am the root 
Qjidthe offs2)ring of David'' (Rev. xxii. 16), and that heheis the key of David 
for the purpose of opening that no man may shut (Pev. ui. 7) ; in the days 
of his flesh, he was known and described as '■ the son of David ; " the whole 
nation of the Jews looked for a son of David to be the Messiah ; all the 
prophets speak of him as a descendant of David, variously styling h im "a rod 
oat oi tJie stem of Jesse (father of Da\4d) " — ; Isaiah xi. 1); "a Righteous 
Branch raised unto David " (Jer. xxiii. 5) ; " a child bom and a son given to 
sit upon the throne of David and liis kingdom " (Is. ix. 6) ; and so on. 

It is, therefore, a vain thing for anyone to attempt to avert the application 
of the "everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure" to Jesus, 
David's son and Lord, the greater than Solomon, on the mere strength of a 
view taken by David and Solomon, which does not exclude this application, 
but which merely declares that the covenant made with reference to Jesus 
was incipiently fulfilled ia Solomon. It may be a question for consideration, 



I 



249 

how it is that a prediction can have two fulfilments, so far separated by time 
and the nature of the event. The fact is evidence of the comprehensiveness of 
the divine word, but no disproof of the fact that the prediction in its ultimate 
and complete bearing has reference to Jesus. This is proved in too many ways 
to leave room for a moment's doubt. 

Assuming this to be settled, let us see, 1st, how much of the covenant has 
been fulfilled in the career of Christ, as so far developed ; and 2nd, what 
Christ will have to do at his future manifestation, in order to fulfil that part 
of the covenant which was, unquestionably, not realised at his first appearing. 

The facts bearing on the fiLrst point may very briefly be summarised : David's 
days having been fulfilled, and he bemg "asleep with his fathers," Jesus was 
bom in Bethlehem, the city of David, of Mary, a virgin, descended in the line 
of David, and espoused to a man named Joseph, who was of the house and 
lineage of David. The event was announced by an angel to shepherds in the 
neighbourhood, watching their flocks by night, in the following language : — 

" Fear not ; for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all 
people. For unto you is born this day, in the city of David, a saviour, which is 
Christ the Lord.'' — Luke ii. 10, 11. 

Zecharias, the father of John, notices the event in the following language : — 

" Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, for He hath visited and redeemed His people; 
and hath raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of His servant David, as He 
spake by the mouth of his holy projphets, which have been since the vvoiid began."— 
Luke i. 68-70. 

Jesus, as we have seen in a previous lecture, was bom without human 
paternity; his conception was due to the power of the Holy Spirit over- 
shadowing the substance of Mary. "Therefore," said the angel "shall he be 
called the Son of God." Thus, in a sense far transcending- the case of Solomon, 
were the terms of the covenant realized — " I will be to him a father, and he 
shall be to me a son." In fact, the divine sonship of Jesus is the cro^Tiing 
feature of his position as the Messiah. No man can scripturally believe that he 
is the Christ, while denying that he is the Son of God. A scriptural confession 
of his name involves the recognition of the two facts expressed in the words of 
Nathaniel: — "Thou art the Son of God; thou art the King of Israel." — 
(John i. 49.) John says, " AVho is he that overcometh the world, but he thiit 
believeth that Jesus is the Son of God ? " — (1 John v. 5.) The divine testimony 
to Jesus, uttered at his baptism, and again at his transfiguration, was couched 
in these words : — " This w my beloved Sun, in whom I am well pleased : hear 
ye him."— (Luke ix. 35.) Hence, the most vStriking feature in the covenant 
made with David shines out in Jesus, who was both son of God and son of 
David ; and in view of it, it is easy to understand the language of David in the 



250 

llOth Psalm, in reference to whicli Jesus confounded the Pharisees so that they 
could not answer again. He said : — 

" What think ye of Christ? whose son is he? They say unto him, The son of 
David. He saith unto them, How, then, doth David in spirit call him Lord, saying, 
The Lord said unto my lord. Sit thou on my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy 
footstool ? If David then call him Lord, how is he his son ?'— Matt. xxii. 42-45. 

Tliis was a question which the Pharisees could not answer from their point 
of view, because, on the suj^position that the Messiah was merely to be a 
natural son of Da^dd, on no principle admissible in Jewish practice could David 
have addressed him as Lord, for that would have been to accord to him a 
position and a deference which could never be recognised as proper to be yielded 
to a son by a father. But in view of the truth, the question admits of an easy 
solution : Christ is the Son of David by the flesh of Mary ; but he is also 
David's Lord, because of a higher parental origin than David; "God hath 
committed all judgment unto him ; that men may honour the Son, even as they 
honour the Father." — (John v. 22, 23.) 

The next feature in the history of Christ corresponds to the next feature in 
the covenant made with David. He did not commit iniquity ; but he was 
" chastened with the rod of men," and with the stripes of the children of men. 
The original Hebrew of this part of the covenant, according to Dr. Adam 
Clarke, is more correctly translated as follows : — " Even in his suffering for 
iniquity, T will chasten hun with the rod of men and with the stripes of the 
children of men." This is intelligible as applied to the death of Christ ; "he 
was cut off; but not for himself." — (Dan. ix. 2^.) 

'•' Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him 
stricken, smitten of God, and^ afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, 
he was bruised for our iniquities ; the chastisement of our peace was upon him ; 
and with his stripes we are healed. . . , The Lord hath laid on him the 

iniquity of us all."— Isa. liii. 4, 6. 

But the mercy of God did not desert liim as it did Saul, who was rejected, 
and as we might presume it did in the case of Solomon, whose last days, so far 
as we have any record, were spent in disobedience. He was forsaken on the 
cross ; but it was only for a moment ; G-od's favour returned with the morning 
which saw his deliverance from the grave of Joseph of Arimathea, and was to 
him an eternal river of joy. His relation to Deity in the whole transaction 
cannot be better expressed than in the words of the 16th Psalm, which Peter, 
on the day of Pentecost, applied to liim : — 

" I have set the Lord always before me; because He is at my right hand, I shall 
not be moved. Therefore my heart is glad and my glory rejoiceth; my flesh also shall 
rest in hope. For Thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt Thou suffer thine 
holy one to see corruption. Thou wilt show me the path of life ; in thy presence is 
Rainess of joy ; at thy right hand there Ar« pleasures for evermore,"— Psa. xvi. S-IU 



251 

In Psaltn Ixxxix, the covenant witk David is repeated in snbstance, and 
here the following language is used, which could not be applied to Solomon: — 

" Also I will make Mm my firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth ; my mercy 
will I keep for him for evermore . . . his seed also will I make to endure 

for ever ; and his throne as the days of heaven" — verses 27-29. 

In no sense was Solomon Jehovah's first-bom ; while of Jesus, the following 
statements are made : — 

" He is the Head of the body, the Church, who is the beginning, the piestborn 
from the dead, that in all things he might have the pre-eminence."— Col. i. 18. 

" For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the 
imag^ of His Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren."— Eom, 
viii. 29, 

" Christ the firstfruits."— 1 Cor. xv. 23, 

In this respect, he fulfils a condition of the covenant made with David, 
which Solomon, in no sense, came up to. And he is " hig-her than the kings of 
the earth," for Paul says "God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a 
name which is above every name ; that at the name of Jesus every knee 
should bow," &c.— (Phil, ii, 10.) 

But when we pass on to consider other things said in the covenant of the 
son promised to David, we find that Jesus has not yet fulfilled them. The 
first item may be stated in the words of Peter, " that he should sit upon the 
throne of David." In no sense can Jesus be said to have done this. The throne 
of David is in ruins. Its condition is described in the following language : 

" Thou hast cast off and abhorred ; Thou hast been wroth with thine anointed. 
Thou hast made void the covenant of thy servant ; Thou hast jn-ofaned his crown 
hy casting it to the ground. Thou hast broken down all his hedges; Thou 
hast brought his strongholds to ruin. All that pass by the way spoil him ; he 
is a reproach to his neighbours. Thou hast set up the right hand of his adversarie3 ; 
Thou hast made all his enemies to rejoice. Thou hast also turned the edge of his 
sword, and hast not made him to stand in the battle. Thou hast made his glory to 
cease, and cast his throne down to the grounds." — Psalm Ixxxix. 38-44. 

This state of things was predicted by Ezekiel in the following terms : — 

" And thou profane, wicked prince of Israel, whose day is come, when iniquity 
shall have an end, thus saith the Lord God, Remove the diadem and take off the crown ; 
this shall not be the same. Exalt him that is low, and abase him that is high. I will 
overturn, overturn, overturn it ; and it shall he no more until he comes whose 

RIGHT IT IS, AND I WILL GIVE IT HIM."— Ezek XXi. 25, 27. 

This prediction was uttered in the reign of Zedekiah, the last Israelitish 
Idng in the line of David, B.C. 593 ; and ever since that time the kingdom 
has been overturned. It was overthrown by Nebuchadnezzar in the lifetime 
'of Zedekiah, and was afterwards trampled down by Grrceco and Eomc. Siuc^j 



252 

the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus, it has had no existence. The land is 
in the possession of the enemy, and the people are scattered as fugitives 
throughout the earth. In view of this, what conclusion is to be drawn from 
the covenant made with David, which expressly guarantees the perpetual 
continuance of David's throne and kingdom, under that son of his who was 
to be the firstborn of Jehovah ? There is only one conclusion admissible 
in the premisses, and that is, that at some future time, Jesus must 
return and re-establish the kingdom of David, and preside therein for God, as 
David did : and to this agree the words of the prophets, as it is written : ''^ After 

tJliS, I WILL EETUEX, AND WTLL BUILD AGAIN THE TABEENACLE OF DaVID, WHICH 

IS FALLEN DOWN ; and I will build again the ruins thereof ; and I will set it 
up." — (Acts XV. 16.) The testimony confirmatory of this conclusion is very 
express. There are the well-known words of Isaiah : 

"For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given ; and tlie government shall be 
upon his shoulder; and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellol-, the mighty 
God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peacs. Of the increase of his government 
and peace th^-e shall be no end ; upon the throne of David, and upon his 
KINGDOM, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice, from hence- 
forth even for ever." — Isaiah ix. 6-7. 

"In tbose days, and at that time, will I cause the Branch of righteousness to grow 
up unto David ; and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land." &c. 
— Jer. xxxiii. 15. 

"Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will sow the house of Israel and the 
house of Judah with the seed of man, and with the seed of beast. And it shall come 
to pass, that like as I have xcatched over them, to pluck up, and to break down, and to 
throw down, and to destroy, and to affiict ; so will I watch over them, to build and to 
PLANT, saith the Lord." — Jer. xxxi. 27-28. 

" For thus saith the Lord ; like as I have brought all this great evil upon this people, 
so will I bring upon them all the good that I hate promised them." — Jer. xxxii. 42. 

" Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will perform that good thing which I 
have promised unto tlie house of Israel and to the house of Judah." — Jer. xxxiii. 14. 

"In that day, saith the Lord, will I assemble her that halteth, and I wiU gather 
her that is driven out, and her that I have afflicted ; and I will make her that halted, 
a remnant, and her that was cast far off, a strong nation; and the Lord shall reign 
over them in Mount Zionfrom henceforth even for ever."" — Micah iv. 6, 7. 

"Thus saith the Lord God, Behold I will take the children of Israel from among 
the heathen, whither they be gone, and will gather them on every side and bring 
them into their own land. And I will make them one nation in the land upon the 
mountains of Israel ; and one King shall be King to them all; and they shaU be no 
more two nations, neither shaU they be divided into two kingdoms any more at all." 
— Ezekiel xxxvii. 21, 22. 

"And they shall build the old wastes, they shall raise up the former desolations, and 
they shall repair the wa^te cities, the desolations of many generations." — Isa. Ixi. 4. 

These predictions will not be realized in the absence of Jesus Christ from i 



253 

the earth. This appears upon the face of the testimonies themselves, but ia 
proved in a way that excludes the possibility of mistake, by Peter' a 
declaration, recorded in Acts iii. 20-21 : — 

"He shall send Jesus Christ, who before was preached unto you ; whom the 
heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath 

SPOKEN BY THE MOUTH OF ALL HiS HOLY PROPHETS SINCE THE WORLD BEGAN." 

From this it follows that the work of restoration so abundantly described 
hj the prophets, will take place at the time that Jesus returns and reappears 
on earth. This will account for Paul's connecting Christ's appearing and 
kingdom as coincident events, in the words " Jesus Christ shall judge the 
quick and the dead at Ms appearing and Ms kincjdom:'-^{l Tim. iv. 1.) 
When he appears, his kingdom will come ; for it is his return to the earth 
that causes his kingdom to be established. Hence we can understand the 
statement that "when the Son of Man shall come in his glory, then shall he 
sit upon the throne of Jus ^Zo7'z/."— (Matt, xxv, 31.) This statement Jesus 
repeats in another form, which only makes its identification with the rC' 
establishment of the kingdom of Israel more certain. He said to his 
disciples — 

'• Verily, 1 say uuto you, that ye who have followed me, in the regeneration 
(which is equivalent to the restitution spoken of by Peter), when the Son of Man shall 
sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the 

TWELVE TRIBES OF ISRAEL." — Matt. xix. 28. 

When this comes to pass, there will be a fulfilment of the words addressed to 
Mary : " And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his 
kingdom there shall be no end." — (Luke i. 33.) And when these words are 
verified, the covenant made with David will find a fulfilment over which no 
obscurity can be cast. 

The covenant guarantees the Messianic establishment of David's kingdom 
in David's presence. The words are " Thine house and thy kingdom shall be 
established for ever before thee." As we have seen, this was partially fulfilled 
in David witnessing Solomon's ascension to the throne before his own death ; 
but it is easy to see how much more completely and substantially it will bo 
fulfilled in the kingdom of David in the hands of Jesus. The kingdom of 
Israel, as ruled by Christ, will be the kingdom of God. The promise to all 
the faithful is that they shall inherit the kingdom of God. — (Luke xxii. 20, 
30 ; Matt. xix. 28; James ii. 5; Luke xiii. 28, 29; xii. 32, 3G; 2 Potor i. 11.) 
Hence David, who was a man after God's own heart, will be among those of 
whom Jesus says, in one of the foregoing list of references, that Abraham, Isaao, 
and Jacob, and all the prophets^of whom David was one — will be seen in tlia 
kingdom of God. This ©aimot mean heaven ; for Peter expressly says " David 



254 

is not ascended into tlie heavens." — (Acts ii. 34.) It is the kingdom to be set 
np in the territory of the Promised Land, vrhen the little stone descends from 
heaven to break in pieces all other kingdoms. David looking forward to this 
time, said in prayer, immediately after hearing the words of the covenant, 
*' Thou hast spoken also of thy servant's house fo?' a great nh\le to come, 
. Therefore, now, let it please thee to bless the house of Thy servant, 
that it may continue for ever lefore Thee.'' — 2 Sam.vii. 19, 29. This prayer is 
answered in the words of Jeremiah, chapter xxxiii. 17, 26 : *' For thus saith the 
Lord, David shall never n-ant a man to sit iipon the throne of the house of Israel. 
. If my covenant be not with day and night, and if I have not 
appointed the ordinances of heaven and earth, then will I cast away the seed 
of Jacoh^ and David :my servant, so that I will not take any of his seed to be 
rulers over the seed of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. For I will cause their 
captivity to return, and have mercy on them." The time for this is now 
not far off, and David himself will be in the land, rejoicing in the greatness 
of his son, who will be a triumphant -v\itn9ss of the truthfulness of Jehovah's 
word. Every nation will come to an end, except the nation of Israel — 
(Jer. XXX. 11), and every royal family will disappear and be forgotten, except 
the family of David, which will be in everlasting remembrance, because an 
everlasting and glorious institution, in the ransomed inhabitants of the globe. 
Thus T^ill be fulfilled the promise that the house of David shall continue for 
ever. 

We have next to observe a feature of the covenant which few modem 
readers of the Eible have been able, in any sense, to apply to Jesus. We refer 
to the 1st clause of the 13th verse : "He shall build a house for my name." 
Understanding this to mean the erection of a place in the earth for the 
worship of Jehovah, it may be considered incredible that such a 2)erformance 
should form any part of Christ's work. At first sight, such a thing may seem 
preposterous and degrading to the dignity of Christ, but, looking closely 
into the subject, we discover a different complexion in it. We shall see that 
not only is the building ©f a temple, to which nations may periodically repair 
for worship, one of the incidents of the age to come, but that the 
performance of this work is connected with the noblest mission of 
the kingdom of God. 

We wiU first caU the reader's attention to the evidence which proves that 
what is affirmed in the covenant made with David wiU be realised in the 
kingdom of Christ. It begins with a statement in Zech. vi. to the following 
effect :— 

•' Behold the man whose name is the Branch, and he shall grow up out oi Ms 
place, and he shall build the temple of the Lord, and he shall bear the glory, and 
phali sit and rule upon his throne, And he shall be a priest upon his th one," 



255 

The applicability of this to Jesus might be doubted from the context, 
vrere it not that the statement cannot be understood of any other than he 
who bears the title occurring in it. The Messiah is uniformly described as 
THE BRANCH, and he alone is to be "a priest upon his throne," 
combining in himseK, like Melchizedeck, the double function of rule in 
temporal matters and intercession in things pertaining to God. Were this 
the only consideration, however, to justify the application of the prophecy 
to Jesus, it would fall short of proving the point. We, therefore, proceed to 
weightier considerations. It is said of the time when Jesus shall reign on the 
throne of his father David, that " many people and strong nations shall come 
to seek the Lord of Hosts in Jerusalem, and to pray before the Lord." — 
(Zech. viii. 22.) This is expressed by Jeremiah as a gathering of the nations 
to the name of the Lord t,o Jerusalem ; in consequence of which,' they walk no 
more in the imagination of their evil heart — (Jer. iii. 17) ; and by Isaiah, as 
the going of many people, saying " Let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, 
TO THE HOUSE OF THE GrOD OF Jacob ; and He wiU teach us of His ways, and 
we will walk in his paths," &c. — (Isaiah ii. 3.) Zechariah describes this in 
the following language : — 

" And it shall come to pass that everyone that Is left of all the nations which 
came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year, to worsJdp the King 
the Lord of Hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles." — Zech. xiv. 16. 

That these things are true of Christ's reign on earth and nothing else, 
must be evident from the fact that they are associated with a time when the 
nations shall cease from war, and when men shall no longer follow the bent of 
their evil inclinations. Such a state of things has never been realized in the 
history of the world. If, then, nations are to go periodically to Jerusalem for 
the purpose of worship, it stands to reason that there will be a place in which this 
act can have suitable effect. It is not to be imagined that a motley assemblage 
of people could conveniently, comfortably, or profitably bring their devotion to 
bear without those customary means of approach, which, in all past times God 
has furnished to those whom He has invited to do homage to Him. Why should 
nations come to Jerusalem, if there were no temple there ? If their worship 
was simply to consist of the sentiment of devotion, this could as well be 
cultivated in the countries they inhabit as at the holy city. The necessity of 
the case requires that there should exist a machinery of worship adequate to 
the grandeur of a dispensation, in which Jerusalem is the religious metropolis 
of the whole world. It is evident from attention to the limited testimony 
quoted, that this wiU exist. Mark for instance, the expression "Let us go into 
the Jiouse of the Lord:' Again " the pots in the Lord's hovse shall be like the 
bowb before the altar."— (Zech. xiv, 20.) "The glory of this LATTiiU uousb 



256 

Eliall be greater than of the former, saith the Lord of Hosts ; and in this 
PLACE will I(jrivepeace."—{B.gLg.n. 9.) " Thoi shall Jerusalem be holy 

And a fountain shall come forth of the house of the Lord, and shall 
■water the valley of Shittim."— (Joel iii. 17, 18.) We quote these indirect 
evidences not so much to prove the point in question as to introduce the great 
and croT\Tiing evidence before which all others pale into insignificance. We 
now refer to the vision of Ezeldel, contained in the last eight chapters of the 
book bearing his name. This portion of the Scripture has baffled all Bible 
commentators, for the simple reason that popular theology can make no use of 
it. To what purpose is the establishment of a temple ritual at Jerusalem, if 
death sends men for final weal or woe, to G-od or the devil ; and if the pre- 
sumed millennium is simply to be a prevalence of " evangelical religion ? " 

The chapters referred to were written after the destruction of Solomon's 
temple by Nebuchadnezzar^ and disclose a state of things which has never 
since that time existed under heaven. The temple was re-built at the return of 
the Jews from Babylon. But Ezekiel's prophecy was not realized in that 
event, as may be seen by a comparison of Ezekiel's prophecy with the facts 
connected with the second temple. The re-built temple, so far from being 
greater than the first, was vastly inferior to it. This cannot be better proved 
than by quoting the following passage from Ezra iii. 12, 13 : — 

"But many of the Priests and Levites, and chief of the fathers, who were andent 
men, that had seen the first house, when the foundation of this house was laid before 
their eyes, wept with a loud voice ; and many shouted aloud for joy; so that the 
people could not discern the noise of the shout of joy from the noise of the weeping 
of the people J for the people shouted with aloud shout, and the noise was heard afar 
off." 

Ezekiel's temple is to be contemporary with a division of the promised land 

to the twelve tribes of Israel. — (Ezekiel xlviii. 20.) The educated reader does 

not require to be informed that this has never taken place since the day of the 

Babylonish captivity. The restoration from Babylon was but a return of the 

two tribes of Judah and Benjamin, and but a small portion of them. The ten 

tribes constituting the Kingdom of Israel, were removed by Shalmaneser the 

king of Assyria, to coujQtries beyond the river Euphrates, and have never 

returned. The conclusion is self-evident ; the land has never been divided to 

the twelve tribes of Israel, as it is to be when Ezekiel's temple is reared. 

Another fact proving the futurity of the prophecy is, that at the time foreseen 

by Ezekiel a portion of the country, measuring at the least forty miles by 

forty, is to be set apart for divine purposes as "a holy oblation." — (Ezek. xlv^ 

1, 4.) In this stand the temple, the holy city, and the habitation of the priests. 

Such a thing, g« every one knows, has never happened in the history of the Holy 

Liand ; from which it follows that the state of things depleted in the chapter 



257 

under consideration, lies in tlie future. This conclusion is established beyond 
all question by the concluding statement of the prophet ; that " the name of 
the aitj from that day shall be THE LORD IS THEEE." 

In view of the certainty that Ezekiel's prophecy is unfulfilled, it becomes 
interesting in the highest degree to glance at what Ezekiel describes. He says, 
in the visions of Grod he was brought into the land of Israel, and set upon a 
very high mountain, from which he beheld the frame of a city to the south. 
He finds himself in the company of a man, " whose appearance was like the 
appearance of brass, with a line of flax ia his hand, and a measuring reed." 
This man, whom he sees standing in the entrance gate of the temple enclosure 
addresses him as follows : — 

" Son of 239an, behold with thine eyes, and hear with thine ears, and set thine heari 
upon all that I shall show thee ; for to the intent that I might show them unto thee, 
art thou brought hither: declare all that thou seest to the house of Israel."— Ezek. 
si. 4. 

Ezekiel then becomes attentive to his guide's operations, and beholds him 
proceed with a series of measurements which he records with great minuteness, 
in the first five chapters. Without following the intricacies of these, let us 
briefly state that Ezekiel is shown a temple exceeding anything ever realized in. 
the history of Israel or any other nation. The temple, a gigantic building, 
with every appliance required in the worship of which it is the centre, stands 
in a walled enclosure, measuring about a mile and a quarter each way. The 
outside wall is pierced with three gates, each gate being flanked with chambers 
for the temple service, and entered by an upward flight of steps. Mounting 
the steps, the prophet sees an inner waU, about 150 feet nearer the temple ; the 
space lying between the inner and the outer wall being described as "the outer 
court," and forming a spacious promenade or pavement. The inner waU has 
gates after the pattern of those in the outer wall. These gates open by eight 
steps into the imner court, in which, about 150 feet removed from the wall, 
stands THE TEMPLE. This is the centre-piece of the vision. For height, 
breadth, and. elaborateness, it exceeds anything devised in human architectiu-e, 
and is only surpassed in interest by the event which the prophet witnessed 
after surveying the external approaches to the building. This event, which he 
saw from the eastern gate of the outer wall, he describes in the following 
language : 

"Behold the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east, and 
his voice was like a noise of many waters, and the earth shincd with His glory, 
. . . And the glory of the Lord came into the house by the way of the gate 
■whose prospect is toward the east." — eh. xliii. 2, 4. 

Ezekiel is then conveyed by the spirit into the inner court, standnig m 



258 

which, he beholds the house filled with the glory of the Lord. He then hears 

the divine voice addressing him as follows : — ■ 

" Son of Man, the place of my throne, and the place of the soles of my feet, 
where I will dwell in the midst of the children of Israel for ever, and my holy 
name shall the house of Israel no more defile ; neither they nor their kings, by 
their whoredom, nor by the carcases of their kings in their high places."— verse 7. 

Afterwards, EzeMel is taken back by the way of the eastern gate, and observes 
that it IS shut, in reference to which the following explanation is given: — 

" This gate shaU be shut, it shall not be opened, and no man shall enter in by it; 
because the Lord, the God of Israel, hath entered in by it, therefore, it shall be 
shut; it is for the prince; the prince, he shall sit in it, to eat bread before the Lord. 
He shall enter by the way of the porch of that gate, and shall go out by the way 
of the same." — ch. xliv. 2. 

At a later stage, Ezekiel received the following information in reference to 

the same gate : 

"The gate of the inner court that looketh toward the east shall be shut the six working 
days ; but on the Sabbath it shall be opened, and in the day of the new moon it shall 
be opened. And the prince shall enter by the way of the porch of that gate without, 
and shall stand by the post of the gate. And the priests shall prepare his burnt 
offering and his peace offerings; and he shall worship at the threshold of the gate ; 
then he shall go for h; but the gate shall not be shut until the evening. Likewise 
the people of the land shall worship at the door of this gate before the Lord, in the 
Sabbaths and in the new moons." — ch. xlvi. 1, 2, 3. 

The temple, we are informed, stands in the centre of an area of country 
measuring forty-two miles from east to west, and about seventeen miles from 
north to south ; which is to be occupied by a class described as "the seed of 
Zadok," who were faithful in ancient times. To the south of this, there is a 
similar tract of country measured off for the Levites, whose duty it will be to 
perform the menial and laborious duties connected with the temple worship. 
Again, to the south of this, measuring forty-two miles from east to west, and 
between nine and ten miles from north to south, a strip of country is allotted 
for the city, and land for fields and gardens. The measurements of the city 
show it to be the most extensive and magnificent that has ever been built. 
Lying four-square, it will occupy an area of about eighty square miles. Each 
wall, east, west, north, and south, measures about nine miles, the total 
circumference being, therefore, about thirty-six miles. In every wall, there are 
three gates, at equal distances, each gate being named after one of the tribes 
of the land. The land l}dng east and west of the city, appropriated for the 
raising of produce, contains about two-hundred-and-seventy square miles, 
forming an adequate provision for the wants of the stupendous city, which 
will be known from that day by the name — Jehovah- shammah, the Lord is 
there. The temple stands on the site of ancient and modem Jerusalem, at the 



259 

foot of mount Olivet, crowning the hill of Zion ; of which it is testified in 
Psalm cxxxii. 13: " The Lord hath chosen Zion ; He hath desired it for His 
habitation. This is My rest for ever ; here will I dwell, for I have desired it." 
The city Kes about' thirty- two miles to the south of the temple. The whole 
territory apportioned is a magnificent square, measuring about forty-two miles 
each way, and forming the tabernacle of Jehovah, as it will be pitched in the 
age to come. 

These details leave no doubt as to the reality of the temple to be erected in 
the day when the fallen tabernacle of David is upr eared by the Son of David. 
The reason that orthodox interpreters are unable to see this, is, that they are 
ignorant of the kingdom of which the temple and its service form a part. 
Another reason is probably to be found in the fact, that the sacrifices superseded 
by the death of Christ are in this temple found restored ; burnt offerings and 
sin offerings, by ''bulls and goats," are required with all the minute ceremonial 
observed under the law of Moses. This, to the majority of people, is a great 
stumbling block. They reason against the impossibility of sacrifices 
being restored after the accomplishment of the anti- typical sacrifice of " the 
Lamb of God taking away the sin of the w«rld." A little reflection, however, 
will dissipate the force of this difficulty. It is evident that the reign of Christ 
on earth is a priestly one. This is stated in the testimony that " he shall be a 
priest upon his throne ; " and is further evident from the statement in Rev. i. 
6 : *'He hath made us kings a:^t> priests unto G-od and his Pather," a double 
function which appears from Rev. v. 10, to have reference to the time when 
Christ shall reign on earth : " Thou hast made us unto our God kings and 
priests; and we shall reign on the earths If, then, the millennial 
dispensation is a priestly one, it is according to the fitness of things, that the 
people should have somewhat to offer in token of their obedience ; and the 
priests, something to present on their behalf. But it will be asked, how can the 
sacrifice of animals be revived, when he who was slain is present in the earth 
as a perfected mediator between God and man ? and since Christ's priesthood 
is in force even now, vn.thout the use of material sacrifices on the part of those 
for whom he officiates, viz., his own household, why need there be material 
sacrifices in the age t© come, when his priesthood is but transfcTred 
from his own household to the world*? The answer to this must take a general 
form. As the sacrifices under the law of Moses pointed forward to the death 
of Christ, so the sacrifices under the *' prophet like imto Moses," may point 
backward to the death of Christ. In the law of Moses, the sacrifices wore 
prospective and typical of that which was to come. Under the law of Christ, 
they may be retrospective and commemorative of that which has been ; after 
the manner of the Lord's supper, which, in Christ's absence, is a standing 



2G0 

tnemorial of his broken body and sbed blood. Wbatever explanation of tlie fact 
may be suggested, there can be no doubt of the fact itself, that sacrifices form 
part of the institutions of the age to come. We gather this, not only ft-om 
Ezekiel, but from a variety of Scripture testimony, of which we cite the 
following examples : — 

" For from the rising of the situ even unto the going down of the same, my name shaH 
be great among the Gentiles ; and in every place incense shall be offered unto my 
name, and a PURE OFFERING ; for my name shall be great among the heathen, 
Baith the Lord of Hosts/' — Mai. i. 11. 

" The multitude of camels shall cover thee, t'-.e dromedaries of Midian and 
Ephah ; all they from Shebah shall come ; they shall bring gold and incense ; and 
they shall show forth the praises of the Lord. All the flocks of Kedar shaK be 
gathered together unto thee; the rams of Nebaioth shall minister unto thee ; they 
shall come up with acceptance on mine nltar, and I will glorify THE HOUSE OF MY" 
GLORY."— Isaiah Ix. 6, 7. 

" And the Lord shall be known tx) Egypt^ and the Egyptians shall know the Lord 
in that day, and shall do sacrifice and oblation; yea, they shall vow a vow m:to the 
Lord, and perform it." — Isaiah xix. 2L 

" For the children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a 
Xii'mce, B.nd without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and 
without a teraphim. Afterwaed shall the children of Israel return and seek the 
Lord their God, and David their king, and shall fear the Lord and His goodness in 
the latter days." — Hosea iii. 4, 5. 

" Yea, fevery pot in Jerusalem and in Judah shall be holiness unto the Lord of 
Hosts; and all they that sacrifice shall come and take of them and seethe therein; 
and in that day there shall be no more the Canaanite in the House of the Lord of 
Hosts."— Zech. xiv. 21. 

" God is the Lord, who has shewed us lights Bind the sacrifice with cords, even 
unto the horns of tlie altau' — Psalm cxviil. 27. 

At first sight, it may appear incongruous that tbe glorious administration 
of power and righteousness characteristic of the reign of Christ should be 
mixed up with a ritual which has been obsolete for centuries, and between 
v/hich and the truth there scarcely exists the 3lement of affinity. There is, 
however, a view of the matter which reveals wisdom in the arrangement. It 
is part of eternal truth that without faith and trial, it is impossible to be 
accepted with God. This principle is unaffected by time or circumstances ; 
it will be as true in the future age as now. Men and women, who live as 
subjects of the Messiah's kingdom, will have to obtain a right to eat of the 
tree of life by faith and obedience, as much as those who now have to struggle 
in the absence of an open vision. But how can their faith be exercised, and 
how can their obedience be tested in the presence of the overpowering fact of 
<^od's visible government of the nations through Jesus and the saints ? Does 



t61 

it not seem as if all scope for faith would be shut out by the subLLme and 
incontestable facts of the time ? and as if obedience would be eclipsed and 
superseded by the practical compulsion brought to bear upon men by the 
existence and supervision of divine government ? As it appears to us, the 
restitution of sacrifice supplies an answer to the question. Called upon to 
perform acts in the worship of God, which in themselves appear needless and 
unsuitable, the faith and obedience of men will be put to as powerful a test as 
in ancient days, when similar things were required at the hand of Israel ; 
their minds will bo educated to submit to the divine wiU, and to have faith in 
the divine intentions by a ritualism unreasonable enough to have no hold upon 
the mind, except such as arises from a recognition of divine authority; 
while, at the same time, their intellects will be enlightened by the lessons 
taught by it in allegory. We must remember that in the age to come, the 
nations subject to Christ and his people will be composed of men and women 
constituted as men and women are now ; and, therefore, standing in need oi 
spiritual education. 

The kingdom of brod, in its millennial phase, is an adaptation to this 
necessity. By the aid of this fact, WB are enabled to see the wisdom of a 
<iispensation which would be out of keeping in a generation spiritually 
perfect. Nations will have to be disciplined in first principles, and exercised 
continually in a divine direction. Left without external stimulus or object 
of occupation, the human mind becomes listless and retrogressive. The most 
"brilliant moral impressions will fade in a state of inactivity. Degeneration 
of this description will be effectually prevented by a system of universal 
compulsory religion, v/hich will require the presence of every man once a year 
at the centre of divine government and worship, and which, for every oflence 
against the laws, will exact the token of penitence afforded in the sacrifice of 
an animal of his property. The mind of all the world will be kept in 
continual motion in a spiritual channel. By this means, mankind, as a whole, 
will be turned from the ways of ignorance and evil, while the powerful hand 
of go vermental repression, brought to bear upon everything antagonistic to 
the temporal and spiritual welfare of the people, will secure a situation 
admitting of the full and effective operation of these ameliorating influences. 

Thus we see a beauty and a force in that clause of the covenant made 
with David, which assigns to the Messiah the duty of building a house to the 
Lord of all the earth. The mechanical part of the process will, of course, 
be performed by the alien. The ntanual labour required to elaborate the 
splendid and spacious architecture exhibited to Ezekiel, will be furnished by 
the stranger ; but the work will be executed under the superviaion of Christ, as 
the temple of Solomon was built to David's dii-ections : — 



262 . 

" The sons of strangers shall build up thy walls, and their kings shall minister unto 
thee; for in my wrath I smote thee, but in my favour have I had mercy on thee . 
The sons also of them that afflicted thee shall come bending unto thee, and all they 
that despised thee shall bow themselves down at the soles of thy feet ; and they shall 
call thee the city of the Lord, the Zion of the Holy One of Israel. Whereas, thou 
hast been forsaken and hated, so that no man went through thee, I will make the*) 
an eternal excellency, a joy of many generations." — Isaiah Ix. 10, 14, 15. 

" And they shall bui'd the old wastes, they shall raist up the former desolations, 
and they shall repair the waste cities, the desolations of many generations. And 
strangers shall stand and feed your flocks, and the sons of the alien shall be your 
ploughmen and your vinedressers."— Isaiah Ixi. 4, 5. 

" Thus saith the Lord God, Behold I will lift up mine hand to the Gentiles, and 
set up my standard to the people : and they shall bring thy sons in their arms, and 
thy daughters shall be carried upon their shoulders. And kings shall be thy nursing 
fathers, and their queens thy nursing mothers : they shall bow down to thee with 
their faces toward the earth, and lick up the dust of thy feet : and thou shalt know 
that I am the Lord: for they shall not be ashamed that wait for me."— Isaiah 
xlix. 22, 23. 

It will be the peculiar honour o^ Jesus to bring all nations to worship 
before God ; and this he will do in virtue of the covenant made with David. 

Little remains to be said in illustration of the remaining provisions of the 
covenant. That God will establish the throne of his kingdom for ever, in the 
hands of Jesus ; and under him, give to Israel the sure dwelling place from 
which they shall never be removed, is made evident in other lectures. 
These two conclusions are amongst the most copiously attested doctrines of 
the Word of God. In the light of them all prophecy is intelligible ; without * 
them, the Old Testament is what orthodox people practically find it to be — a dark 
vision, and a dead letter. For this, the Apostasy is responsible. By intermixing 
pagan dogmas mth the doctrine of revelation, it has succeeded in mystifying 
the oracles of God to an extent which is hopeless as regards the majority of 
people. It has drawn a thick veil over their faces ; it has made the Bible 
unintelligible, and brought it into ridicule and contempt with many who, with 
a better understanding, would bow before the sublimity and splendour of the 
scheme it unfolds for the redemption of this fair planet from the evil that now 
reigns. This lamentable result cannot be remedied to any material extent at 
present. A few here and there will surrender to the power of judgment and 
testimony; but the great majority will continue in bondage to the power of 
earor numerically elaborated. Seduced by the deception practised upon their 
senses by the circumstances existing in society, they are deaf to the voice of 
reason; they look around them, and behold a crowd walking in the stereotyped 
ways of popular religion ; and though, taken man by man, they could 
estimate their opinions at their proper vahie — which, in the majority of cases, 
from the ignorance that prevails, is no value at aU — yet the mere dead- weight 



263 

of numbers gives the collective sentiment a power wliich they cannot resist , 
and they allow themselves to be dragged like manacled slaves at the chariot 
wheels of a system of faith which will not stand for a moment when tried on 
its own merits. Every one man in the crowd sees the rest as a crowd, and 
overpowered by the sight of the crowd, he bows to the collective opinion, 
though it be but a mere traditional bias, and not a conviction on evidence. 
In this way, each man in the great orthodox communities, is held in bondage 
by all the rest, and the bondage is riveted hard and fast by the influence of 
the church, chapel, college, vestry, school, bazaar, tea party, private interest, 
and the whole machinery of the system. Nothing will break into this 
intellectual slavery but the iron rod of the Son of David. When he comes 
to vest, in his single person, the authority now exercised by all the kings 
and parliaments of the world ; when he lays hold, with unsparing hand, 
upon the vested interests which obstruct the path of general progress*, and 
shivers to atoms the rotten fabrics of respectable superstition, when he 
overturns the institutions which foolish crowds fall down and worship, 
through the mere power of antiquity ; when he sends forth to all the world 
the decrees of a divine and omnipotent absolutism ; when he sets up a system 
of worship to which he will command conformity on pain of death; 
and demands the allegiance of every soul to be personally tendered at 
Jerusalem, the city of the great king ; when he comes to sweep, from the face of 
the earth, the tangled cobweb of existing institutions which shelters- ignorance, 
vice, and misery, while professedly based on right, religion, and morality ; and to 
deal, with even hand, the swift and powerful awards of unerring justice ; when 
he, in fact, breaks in pieces the whole constitution of human society, as now 
put together, and substitutes for it a new order of things, having the revived 
kingdom of David, in the land of Palestine, as its centre and basis of 
operations — then, and not till then, will mankind see their folly, and " come 
from the ends of the earth, and say, surely our fathers have inherited lies and 
vanity, and things whorein there is no profit." — (Jer. xvi. 19.) 

There is no hope till then. Men may preach, and write, and spend money ; 
print Bibles, support "ministers of the gospel," send missionaries to the 
heathen, get up societies for putting down the various evils that 
afflict society and for popularising government: such efforts will 
effect a modicum of good in the channels of activity; but so far 
as bringing mankind into harmony with divine wisdom is concerned, 
they might as well attempt to construct a ladder to the moon. Eri-or 
will predominate ; selfishness will prevail ; monopoly will lift its ugly head 
tp heaven ; poverty will degrade the millions ; war devour its prey and impose 
its burdens on the living ; in a word, sin will eeign till the Lion of the tribe 



264 

of Judah comes upon the scene in righteous indignation, and scatters tlie proud 
in the imagination of their hearts, taking upon himself the mighty task -which 
long and dismal centuries have proved man's utter incapacity for; he will 
*' judge the people righteously and govern the nations upon earth." — (Psalm 
Ixvii.) " In that day there shall be one Lord, and his name One." — (Zech. xiv» 
9,^ Till then, we wait in faith and patience. 



LECTURE IX. 



TEE SECOXD C O:\1IXG OF CERIST TEE ONLY CERISTIAy 

EOFE, 

Hope i^ the peculiar feature of the Gospel. Other systems boast of ethical 
principles which it is expected the judgment will sanction, and the enlightwied 
will, apply to the formation of character ; but the Gospel excels these in its 
power to produce the results aimed at by them, but which they fail to achieve 
with all their laboured philosophy. Theoretical morality may practically in- 
fluence superior minds ; but it is powerless to raise the fallen, or develop moral 
fructification in natually barren minds, because their is no soil for its gi'owth 
in such cases. Its appeals are to trained intellect and moral aspiration ; and 
for that reason, it is impotent with th€ vast majority of mankind, who are 
awanting in those conditions. Christianity approaches human nature in a more 
attractive garb. It comes, not with hard reasonings and lifeless aphorisms, 
but with personal love and inspiring promises. Laden with tenderness and 
cheer, it subdues the obduracy, and dissipates the lethargy, of human hearts, and 
bears them upward to moral perfection by the influence of its affections and 
hopes. It is exactly adapted to the necessities of human mature, present and 
prospective. It only requires to be received with full assurance of faith ; and 
then, unlike human systems of philosophy, it satisfies the heart while enlight- 
ening the intellect, and tranquillizes the spirit, which can elsewhere find no resi 
in this world of anxiety and care. Nevertheless, it develops these results by an 
intelligent process. It operates by means of the ideas which it commimicates to 
the mind. There is nothing unaccountable in its mode of operation. Its love 
ia A matter of specific assurance, to be realized by faith, and not a mysterioizs 



265 

influence stealing miraculously over the heart. Its hopes grow out o± definite 
promises, understood and assuredly believed, and are not shapeless ecstacies of 
incomprehensible origin. Its operations are altogether effected on truly rational 
principles. Designed for human nature, it is adapted to its mental constitution, 
and powerful on natural methods, to elevate and purify all who submit them- 
eelves to its teachings, and give earnest heed thereto. 

Now in the present lecture, we purpose to make manifest the truth of the 
proposition, that the great hope of Christianity relates to the second (personal) 
coming of the Lord Jesus ; that that event is the central object upon which 
enlightened anticipation lays hold as the climax of Christian desire, the crisis 
of Christian reward; and that, therefore, this truth is one of the main influences 
by which the Christian heart is purified, and the Christian himself pre^Dared and 
made '' meet for the master's use." By the second coming of the Lord Jesus, is 
meant the event obviously signified by the language, viz., the return from 
heaven to earth of our Saviour, who is now at the right hand of God. It will 
be admitted that Christ was really on the earth during his sojourn among men, 
eighteen hundred years ago, and that he ascended bodily to heaven after the 
resurrection. The proposition, then, is, that at a certain time he will descend 
just as really as he ascended, and appear in person on the earth, as the same 
Lord Jesus who sojourned in Judea among the Jews and Eomans. We assert 
this to be the teaching of the word of God, and are more especially anxious to 
demonstrate its essentiality as the true Christian hope, in opposition to that 
great delusion which teaches that the occurrence of death is the coming of the 
Lord to those whom it overtakes. 

There is only " one hope," as there is only "one faith and one baptism." 
This is the teaching of Paul, in Ephesians iv. 4, 5 : " There is one bodj- and one 
spirit, even as ye are called in one hope of your calling." That this "one 
hope " is an essential constituent of the Gospel, is evident from Paul's words to 
the Colossians, chap. i. 5, where, speaking of " the hope which was laid up for 
them in heaven^ (Christ being there), he says, "Whereof ye heard before in 
the word of the truth of the Gospeir He even goes the length of saying " We 
are saved hy hope " (Eom. viii. 24), and solemnly assures the Hebrews that 
their ultimate salvation was contingent upon their adherence to that 
hope. His words are, " Whose house are we, if we hold fast the conjidoue 
and the rejoicing of the HOPE^rw unto the e?j^."— (Heb. iii. 6.) His language 
to the Colossians is equally striking on this point : — 

"He will piesent you holy and unblamable and unreprovable in his slight; if ?/« 
continue in the faith, grounded and settled, a" d be not mowid away from the hope of 
THE Gospel."— Col. 22, 23. 

These testimonies ought to impress us with a sens© of the gi'avity of tho 



266 

question about to be considered. It is no light thing to be doctrinally mistaken 
as to that which we should hope for. What a misfortune to spend our spiritual 
energies in looking for that which God has never promised ! Such a mistake 
implies ignorance of the real "hope of the Gospel ; " and this " ignorance/ 
says Paul, " alienates from the life of God." — (Eph. iv. 18.) What God has 
never promised, no one will ever receive ; for how should the idle longings of 
man divert the purposes of the unsearchable Almighty ? especially when the 
gatifying of those longings would involve the failure of the promises really 
given. "According to your faith be it unto you." This is a divine principle. — 
(Matt. ix. 29.) If a man squander his faith upon that which has no foundation 
in truth, he sows to the wind ; and though sincere error of this type may not 
be judicially punished, it certainly will not be rewarded, but will perish in the 
empty whirlwind of its own producing. The faith vrhich builds its house upon 
the foundation-rock of the assured promises of God, will alone withstand the 
storm that will sweep away " the refuge of lies." 

Before adducing specific testimony as to the coming of the Lord, it will be of 
advantage to direct attention to certain facts, which wiU pave the way for a 
proper apprehension of that testimony. These facts relate to the personal 
ministry of Christ when on earth. During his sojourn in the land of Judea^ 
which he travelled constantly for three years, doing wonderful works in 
attestation of his divine mission, he proclaimed the things of the kingdom of 
God, and asserted his Messiahship in connection therewith, as has been j)roved 
in previous lectures. This proclamation had the effect of di-awing around him 
many disciples, and of causing them to look upon him as the anointed king of 
Israel in a literal sense, and destined to effect "the redemption of Israel " from 
the Romans and all other nations, and to estabhsh the kingdom of God in 
triumph over aU the earth. This view of Christ, created in the minds of his 
disciples by his own teachings, is condemned by thousands of well-meaning 
but mistaken people. Vv"e saw in a former lecture how uncalled-for is the 
condemnation, and how scriptural (^ith shght modification,) is the view 
condemned. We now desire to point out that the teaching of Christ on the 
subject had a further effect upon the minds of the disciples. It created in them 
an expectation that they themselves should ohare the kingly honours of Christ 
at the time when his kingly mission should be manifested. This is also 
universally admitted to be a fact, although condemnation is as freely 
administered here as in the other case. The disciples are reprobated as 
" carnally minded," for having looked for what is generally disparaged as " a 
temporal kingdom." Now, we shall find that there is as much injustice in this 
imputation against the taste and judgment of the disciples, as there is in the 
one which the last lecture was intended to refute. There was no doubt a good 



267 

deal of unhallowed ambition among them, which their divine master repeatedly 
strove to repress ; but this ambition did not show itself in inventing a false 
doctrine, or carnally perverting a true one. It rather manifested itself in the 
form of impropriety of spirit, in relation to that which was irne. It gave them 
mistaken ideas as to the object of the kingdom of God, and the principles on 
which admittance to it was to be granted ; but it did not cause them to mis- 
apprehend the nature of that kingdom itself. There is a distinction here that 
is generally overlooked ; and this oversight leads to lamentable conclusions. 
Their hope of inheriting the kingdom of G-od in substantial manner, like their 
estimate of the kingship, was founded both on prophetic testimony, and the 
express teaching of our Lord himself. In the prophets they had observed such 
testimony as the following : 

" The saints of the Most High shall take the kingdom, and possess the kingdom for every 
even for ever and ever." — Dan. vii. 18. 

" The time came that the saints possessed the kingdom.'' — verse 22. 

"And the kingdom, and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under 
THE WHOLE HEAVEN shall be given to the people of the saints of the Most High." — 
verse 27. 

"Let the saints' be joyful in glory, let them ^ng aloud upon theif beds. Let the 
high praises of God be in their mouth, and a two-edged sword in their hand, to 
execute vengeance upon the heathen, and punishments upon the people ; to bind 
their kings with chains, aiid their nobles with fetters of iron ; to execute upon them 
the judgment written : this honour have all his saints."— Psalm cxlix. 5-9. 

" Instead of thy fathers (referring to Christ), shall be thy children (viz., the 
saints, his people), whom thou mayest make princes in all the earth." — Psalm xlv. 16. 

"Behold, a king shall reign in righteousness, and princes shall rule in judgment:^ 
• — Isaiah xxxii. 1. 

" I will gather the remnant of my flock (of Israel) out of all countries whither I 
have driven them, and will bring them again to their folds; and they shall be fruit- 
ful and increase ; and I will set up shepherds over them, which shall feed them," d^c, 
— Jer. xxiii. 3-4. 

".4nd saviours shall come up on Mount Zion, to judge the mount of Esau; and 
the kingdom shall be the Lord's."~Obadiah, verse 21. 

And they had noted the teaching of our Lord himseH to the same effect in 

the following recorded instances : " Blessed is that servant whom his lord when 

he cometh shall find so doing. Verily, I say unto you, he shall make him 

ruler over all his goods.''— {Matt xxiv. 4G, 47) "And so he that had 

received five talents came and brought other five talents, saying, Lord, 

thou deliveredst unto me five talents; behold I have gained beside tliem 

five talents more, His lord said unto him, Well done, thou good and faithful 

servant, thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will mahe thee ruhr over 

m'iny things.''— {Mutt. xxv. 20, 21.) "And he said unto him (that had gained 

the ten pounds,) Well done, thou good servant, because thou haat been faithful 



268 

in a very little, have thou anthority over ten cities^ — (Luke xix. 17.) Again, 
Jesus said to the chief priests and elders of the Jews, '^ The kingdom of God 
shall be taken from you, nnd given to a nation bringing forth the fruits there^ 
of.'' At the time he said so, the chief priests and rulers were in possession of 
the kingdom of Israel, which having been originally established by God, was 
called the kingdom of God. Now the generality of people can understand the 
meaning of this predicted taking of the kingdom from them. They know as a 
matter of history that the Jewish polity was abolished, and that in fulfilment 
of Christ's prediction, its rulers were deposed from their seats of authority, and 
in fact, " miserably destroyed " in the awful judgments that overtook the city 
of Jerusalem. But when directed to the second part of the statement, they 
immediately stumble. " It shall he given to a nation hringing forth the fruits 
thereof. '' Most people understand the taking, but what about the giving ? 
The tiling tahen is the thing given ; ergo, the kingdom of Israel, which was 
taken from the chief priests and Pharisees, shall be given to " a nation 
bringing forth the fruits thereof." This is seK-evident. The only question 
requiring settlement is as to who are the fruit-producing nation ; and this is 
easily answered. Jesus said to his disciples, " Fear not, Little flock -.for it is your 
Father's good pleasure to give YOU the kingdom." — (Luke xii. 32.) He further 
said, in answer to Peter's question, " Lord, we have forsaken aH and followed 
thee ; what shall we have therefore ? " 

•*! say nnto you, that ye which have followed me, in the regeneration, when the 
Son of Man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve 

THRONES, JUDGINa THE TWELVE TRIBES OF ISRAEL." — Matt. xix. 27, 28. 

Again, when the disciples were assembled at the last supper, he said unto 
them — 

" Ye are they which have continued with me in my temptations. And I appoint 
unto you a kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto me ; that ye may eat and drink 
at my table in my kingdom, Aiu) sit on thrones, judging the twelve tribes of 
Israel."— Luke xxii. 28-30. 

Here is a complete identification of "the nation bringing forth the fruits there- 
of." Thatnationconsistsof the disciples of our Saviour, who is himseK at their head 
as " THE HBiE." They are styled by Peter (1 Epist. ii. 9) " a chosen generation ; 
a EOTAL PEiESTHOOD ; a holy nation ; a peculiar people ; " agreeing with the 
testimony that they will yet inherit the kingdom of God which was taken from 
the Pharisees, and which, though now in ruins, is to be restored in glorious 
plenitude. Who can persist in blaming the early disciples for harbouring an 
expectation which was not their own " carnal conception,'* but the express 
teaching of their divine master? None will do so but those who are so enslaved 
by established systems of error, that they cannot exercise discernment in the 



269 

study of the Scriptures. And alas ! many sucli there are 1 Myriads of most 
respectable people are hopelessly perverted by the tQachings of that hoary 
system of error, which lies like a vast incubus upon mankind. They are held 
in spiritual bondage. They are asserting their independence in every other 
department of thought. They are breaking down the barriers which an 
antiquated superstition had raised in the way of free thought, and throwing 
aside the shackles by which it had fettered enterprize and investigation. They 
are discovering new sciences, — creating new systems, — inventing new 
appliances, — adopting new habits ; but in religion, they seem afraid to think 
for themselves. They slavishly bow to tradition, and lay themselves at the 
feet of an order of men, whose interest is to maintain the existing order of 
things, finding it more easy to the flesh to conform, than to give themselves 
any trouble about questions which would bring down the ire of the teachers^ 
and excite the opposition of their misguided flocks. Thus is the great apostacy 
perpetuated from day to day ; thus has it become established and consolidated 
under respectable and learned auspices ; and thus has it become so deeply 
imbedded in society, that nothing will eradicate it but the uprooting judgments 
of the Highest. These will come, thanks to God, and sweep away the vast refuge 
of religious lies which overspread the globe like network. These will convince 
where argument is powerless. These will sober the intoxicated nations, who 
^are now reeling under the influence of the apocalyptical wine of abomination 
which they have drunk at the hands of THE GEEAT HAELOT CITY ; 
and afterwards will a milder dispensation minister the healing influences of 
truth and righteousness, and chase ignorance and error into the murky shades 
of the past. 

But to return from this digression. If the disciples were so egregiously 
mistaken as they are supposed to be, in their idea of Christ's kingdom, and the 
position which they should hold in it, it is remarkable that we never read of 
any correction by Christ of that mistake. There were three occasions on 
which such correction would have been exceedingly appropriate, and which, in 
fact, would inevitably have called it forth, had it been required. The first was 
when " the mother of Zebedee's children" came with her two sons — James 
and John, saying, " Grant that these my two sons may sit, the one on thy right 
hand and the other on thy left, in thy hlngdomy — (Matt. xx. 20-21.) Now 
according to the popular view, here was the time to launch forth in condemna- 
tion of the earthliness and carnal misdirected ambition supposed to bo 
indicated in the request ; and doubtless the Saviour, who was never slow to 
correct the misconceptions of his disciples, nor even to rebuke with severity, 
would have done so if the request had really been of the nature to call for it ; 
but how different from anything of tkis kind is his answer. Not a word of 



270 

censure ! not the softest whisper of implied rebuke ! Rather a direct and signal 
confirmation of the idea embodied in the fond mother's petition. " Ye know 
not what ye ask," says he . . "To sit on my right hand and on my 
left, is not mine to give, but it shall be given to tlicmfor whom it is prepai'ed 
of my Father y So that instead of pronouncing her request inadmissible, he 
actually declares that the position requested ?ri^^ be given to those for whom 
it is prepared. — (verses 22, 23). 

The second occasion occurred after the resurrection. Jesus joined two of his 
disciples as they walked to the village of Emmaus — (Luke xxiv. 13), but held 
their eyes that they should not know him ; and they conversed with him on the 
subject of his own death. In the course of conversation, one of them, giving 
expression to the view shared by the disciples generally, said " We trusted 
that it had teen he which should have redeemed Israel." — (verse 21.) 
Here again was the time to explain their misconception, had it been such ; 
but here again there is an entire absence of any remark of that nature. He 
uttered a rebuke, but it did not refer to what they did believe, but to what 
they did not believe. " O fools," exclaimed he, " and slow of heart to beHeve 
ALL that the prophets have spoken ! Ought not Christ to have suffered these 
things and to enter into his glory ? " — (verse 25, 26.) He reproached them 
for disbelieving in his sufferings, and not for believing in his kingly glory. 

The third time was immediately prior to the ascension. It is stated in Acts 
1. 6, that when Jesus and his disciples were come together, the disciples asked 
him, saying " Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?" 
They had had their eyes opened to the fact and necessity of his sufferings ; but 
seeing that these were now accomplished, and that he had been gloriously 
resurrected from the dead, they evidently thought that the time had at last 
arrived when their cherished hope of national restoration under the Messiah 
should be realized ; and so they asked him if he would at that time bring their 
desires to pass. Now it is a notable circumstance, that this question was put 
after Christ had spoken to the disciples of "the things pertaining to the kingdom 
of God duriru) forty days " — (verse 3).' This fact suggests the supposition that 
the question was based on the teaching they received during that time. At any 
rate, how was the question received ? With discouragement and rebuke? Nay: 
but, as in the previous case, with confirmatory answer : " It is not for you to 
know the times and the seasons which the Father hath put in His own power." 
— (v. 7.) This was equivalent to affirming that " times and seasons" had been 
provided for the event contemplated in their question, — that is, that the event, 
"the restoring again of the I^ingdom of Israel," would readily come to pass 
in process of time, but that it was not proper for them to know when. How 
inappropriate would such an answer have been, had theii' supposition as to the 



271 

fact of such restoration been mistaken. But the fact is, there was no question.' 
as to the event itself. Jesus had been enlightening them during forty days, ra 
reference to it. Their enquiry related purely to the- time of the event, and his 
answer was confined to that same thing. They supposed the event would then 
transpire. "They thought that the kingdom of G-od should immediately 
appear." — (Luke xix. 11.) This was the peculiar error of early times. They 
did not err in believing that Grod would establish His kingdom on earth, and 
that Christ should visibly manifest himself as the "king over all the earth" 
— (Zech. xiv. 9) ; for these things have been abundantly testified in the prophets 
and proclaimed by Jesus himself. Their mistake lay in supposing thp.t they 
would be accomplished in their own day. The moderns have just gone to the 
other extreme. They do not looli for tlie kingdom of God at all. They 
magnify the sacrificial into unscriptural proportions, and omit the kingly 
a-ltogether. They exclude the kingdom of G-od, knowing nothing of it, and 
believe in nothing concerning it, while the death of Christ . overshadows and 
ensanguines every doctrine in their religious system. The disciples only saw 
the king in Christ, and expected his manifestation in their own times ; the 
mcderns only see the sacrijice, and consider his mission accomplished in the 
supposed saving of immortal souls at death. Thus both have erred, but the 
moderns have gone to the most dangerous extreme, from which a retreat is 
absolutely imperative in order to salvation. 

The mistake of the disciples was corrected in due time. The occurrence of 
Christ's crucifixion and subsequent resurrection and ascension, supplied the lack 
in their knowledge, enabling them to see that the promised glories of the 
future ag'e were not attainable by mortal man without a sacrificial interven- 
tion — a tasting of death for every man, by which "many sons might be 
broLight to glory." But this addition to their knowledg^e did not divert their 
attention from these glories. Far otherwise ; the death of Christ apart from 
its prospective relationship, had no attractiveness ; its interest and importance 
arose out of its connection with the glorious result it achieved. So that instead 
of shutting out the kingdom from their mind, it only intensified their apprecia- 
tion thereof, by showing them its value in the greatness of the sacrifice 
necessary to secure it. It gave eagerness to their ardency, leading thera 
intensely to desire the consummation of "the glory to be revealed." They there- 
fore said, " Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel ? " 
They evidently had no idea of Christ leaving them again. They had forgotten, 
the many parables in which he had taught them his approaching departure 
into "a far country," from which he should afterwards return, "to tako 
account of his servants."— (Luke xix. 12 ; Matthew xxv. 11, &c.) Only ono 
feeling was uppermost in their minds- -a desire that the Idiigdoiu of God 



272 

should immediately appear. When, therefore, " he was taken up, and a cloud 
received him out of their sight," "they looked stedfastly toward heaven," 
evidently struck with wonderment at the unexpected and inexplicable occur- 
rence. Christ taken away from them again ! They were utterly unable to 
understand the new disappointment. Their hopes had been raised to the 
highest pitch by a companionship of forty days, and the grief which had 
overwhelmed them during their master's incarceration in the tomb, had been 
effaced by a sweet communion on '' the things pertaining to the kingdom of 
God ; " and now again, their Lord and Master, their best friend, their hope 
and salvation, he on whom their whole affection and their most yearning desire 
vere concentrated, had left them to the gloom of incomprehensible disappoint- 
ment ; for it must be remembered that the disciples did not understand what 
had taken place. What were they to do ? They were again cast upon the 
world ; again thrown into perplexity. But this time relief was at hand : — 

" Two men stood by them in white apparel, and said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand 
ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus which is taken up feom you into 

HEAVEN, SHALIi SO COME IN LIKE MANNER AS YE HAVE SEEN HIM GO INTO HEAVEN." 
—Acts i. 10, 11. 

And here begins the specific testimony in support of the proposition of the 
lecture. The disciples were comforted in their perplexity by being assured 
that Jesus would come again; this was the balm administered to their 
troubled spirits ; this, the hope by which they reconciled themselves to the 
absence of their Lord and Master. From that day forward, it became the 
central doctrine around which all their teaching revolved, the constantly 
prominent and essentially distinguishing feature of the glad tidings they 
proclaimed. Jesus himself had repeatedly taught them the doctrine of his 
return, even previous to his crucifi:xion. The parable of the nobleman (Luke 
XIX. 11, 12,) was intended for this very purpose; for it is said that he used it 
" because they thought that the kingdom of God shotdd immediately appear," 
Its teaching is very manifest. 

" A certain nobleman went into a far country, to receive for himself a kingdom, 
AND TO RETURN. And he called his ten servants, and delivered them ten pounds, 
and said unto them, Occupy till I come . . . And it came to pass that 

WHEN HE WAS RETURNED, having received the kingdom, then he commanded those 
servants to be called unto him," &c. 

By this, the disciples were informed that Jesus should be taken up to heaven 
to do a work of preparation, and be invested with power, and should afterwards 
return to the earth, and then judge his servants ; awarding to them the ruler- 
ship of ten cities, or the ignominy of a shameful rejection, according 
to their deserts (see rest of the parable). It was an amplification of his other 
statement : " Thoxi; shalt be recompensed at the eesuekection of the just " — 



273 

a resurrection which does not take place until " the Lord himself shall descend 
from heaven with a shout." — (1 Thess. iv. 16.) The parable of the ten virgins 
is to the same purport. The absent bridegroom is put for the ascended Christ, 
and the waiting virgins for those who '' look for his appearing." Besides other 
parables of a like effect, Jesus had plainly said " The days will come when 
the bridegroom shall "he tahen from them (the disciples) '* (Matt. ix. 15) ; 
and had assured themselves without a figure : ^' If I go and prepare a place 

for you, I WILL COME AGAIN AND EECEIVE YOU UNTO MYSELF." — (John xiv. 3.) 

But they were not able to understand the simple lesson, for the reason that • 
Christ was with them, and they never expected him to leave them. They 
could not see what his ^'return^^ could mean, when they knew nothing of a 
going away ; but when the days came that the bridegroom was taken from 
them, "then remembered they his words." The announcement of the angels 
would doubtless revive the many lessons which Jesus himself had taught them 
as to his purposed departure and his intended return to establish the kingdom ; 
and thenceforward did the second coming of the Lord become their cherished 
hope — the great event to which they looked for salvation. It was the thing 
they preached and wrote about, the thing they hoped and prayed for, the top- 
stone of the system of faith which they promulgated. Of course, it did not, 
and could not exclude, but rather involved and necessitated the doctrine of 
Christ's sacrifice for sin, and the necessity for contrition and personal regen- 
eration ; for the second coming of the Lord was only good news to those who 
loved him, and who were prepared to meet him, and were fitted to be with 
him. Yet it was the great doctrine to which the others were subordinated. 
We find Peter teaching it in one of his first addresses after the ascension of 
Christ :— 

" And. he shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you, whom the 
"heaven must receive, until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath 
spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began." — Actsiii. 20-21. 

And the same apostle, in writing to the elders among "the strangers 
scattered abroad," repeated the doctrine in the following connection : — 

" The elders whc are among you, I exhort, who am also an elder, and a witness of 
the sufferings of Christ; and also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed. 
Feed the flock of God . . . and when the chief shepherd shall appear, ye 
shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away." — 1 Peter v. 1, 2-4. 

Thus, as regards the immediate disciples of our Lord, it is proved beyond all 
question, that his second coming was their great hope, — in fact, their ofilg 
hope, for what other hope could they have ? They loved their master dearly, 
and knew that his return to them would be their own deliverauco from the 
imperfections of a sinful body, and the annoyances of wicked men, and not 



274 

only so, but the establishment on earth of " glory to God in the Highest, 
peace on earth, and goodwill among men." To what other event, then, could 
they look with Christian hope than to the coming of Clirist ? To what other 
event could they look with any hope at all ? No event in their lifetime had 
promise for them ; and what was there in death except a lightning-bridge to 
the resurrection ? For them it had none of the fascination with which modem 
preaching has invested it. They did not recognize in "sudden death " " sudden 
glory." Death to them, instead of being "the portal of bliss," was " the gate 
of conniption." It was the bondage of that hereditary mortality from which 
Christ had come to deliver them — the bereaving grave-sleep in which they 
should deeply slumber till the return of their master to wake them to an 
incorruptible resuiTection, when they should say " O death, where is thy 
sting ? O grave where is thy victory ? " No ; their hope was not death, but 
the return of the Lord to wliich all their personal hopes and fears, and all 
their expectations concerning the fulfilment of God's promises, inevitably 
directed them. Now, as it was with the apostles, so did it become with those 
who w^ere afterwards converted to the Christian faith. The gospel preached, 
conveyed the same hopes which filled the bosoms of the preachers. Having 
proffered immortality for its basis, Christ's sacrifice as the means presented for 
faith, and the promised kingdom as " the inheritance " in which immortality 
would be enjoyed, it naturally led their minds to the coming of Christ as the 
great realizing event ; for all the promises contaiued in it go forward to " the 
revelation of Jesus Christ " as the time of fulfilment. Did Paul desire to 
attain to the resurrection from among the dead? — (Phil, iii. 11.) He 
expected to be included among "those that are Christ's at his co^vtixG." — 
(1 Cor. XV. 23.) Did he look forward to "a crown of righteousness " to be 
received from " the Lord, the righteous judge ? "— (2 Tim. iv. 8.) He did not 
expect its bestowment till "his appeaeixq and his kingdom," (verse 1,) 
referred to by "that day," in verse 8. Now, were not these the hopes 
communicated in the Gospel to all who embraced it ? Resurrection to eternal 
life, and inheritance in the kingdom of God, is the salvation offered to every 
son of Adam without distinction of age or station. If a man receive that 
promised salvation iu the sense of believing it, he "rests in hope." Of 
what.^ Of its fulfilment. He may labour in the work of seK-preparation 
with great devotedness — working out his own salvation with fear and 
trembling ; he may foUow righteousness with ardour, nursiug moral life with 
enthusiasm ; he may busy himself in the prosecution of every benevolent work, 
and take delight in pressing the Gospel upon the attention of his f eUow-men : 
not only may do, but must do, if he would be an accepted servant when 
his Lord comes to take account of his stewardship ; but what is the inmost 



I 



275 

feeling of his nature, if he be a true man ? Hope — nay, constant longing 
desire — ^for the salvation he preaches to others. That is, tired of his own 
imperfections and faults as a perishable human being, he yearns for the 
immortality promised, and grieved vdth. prevailing perversion and injustice, 
as politically and socially exemplified around him, he longs to be a witness of 
and partaker in, the perfection of the kingdom of Grod. Now as these "things 
hoped for " cannot be attained till the coming of the Lord to bring them to 
pass, is it not plain that that coming will be the uppermost anticipation in his 
mind? It matters not that it is unlikely to occur in his lifetime; because, 
whether he live or die, it will be the time of his deliverance, and equally im- 
portant as a matter of prospective contemplation a thousand years before the 
event, as to a Christian contemporaneous with it- It is only the popular 
dogma of immortal- soulism, as involving the belief in a conscious death-state 
in which spiritual destinies are sealed, that deranges the harmony of 'New 
Testament teaching on this point. If Christians at their death are really 
transported to heaven, to enjoy reward in the presence of the Saviour, the 
doctrine of his return to the earth cannot have any practical interest for them, 
because their salvation is altogether independent of it. They die, and are 
SAVED, according to the common teaching ; they go to heaven and see Clnist : 
therefore, 'heir attention is naturally concentrated on death, as the great 
revealing event, and diverted from the coming of Christ, which they come to look 
upon as a sort of profitless and even questionable doctrine. In fact, the great 
majority of rehgious people go the length of rejecting it altogether, as a carnal 
conceit, and interpret all references to it in the New Testament as meaning 
the occurrence of death. What a mighty delusion ! What a fatal heresy ! Yet 
the natural fruit of the corrupt tree on which it grows. If popular belief as 
to the death-state be correct, then the other is the logical result, and "orthodox" 
people who go to that extreme, are only consistent. But take away the doctrine 
of the immortality of the soul — the root of all evil in a theological sense— and 
harmony is restored. We see the righteous dead asleep in corruption, and 
perceive the necessity of the Redeemer's advent to wake them to incorrupti- 
bility and life, and the essential importance of that event as the object of hope 
during their lifetime. 

We were endeavouring to show that the second coming of Christ was the 
hope of Christians converted by the preaching of the apostles. Wo shall now 
follow up the arguments advanced by quoting a number of passages from the 
epistles addressed to them, in which the doctrine is set forth with a plainness 
which must carry conviction to every ingenuous mind : — 

"For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, ttnicliing 
us that, aenying uugodlincsB and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, riglitcousiy, 



276 

and godly in the present world, looking for that blessed hope and the glorious 

APPEARING OF THE GREAT GOD AND SaVIOUR, JeSUS ChRIST." — TituS ii. 11-12. 

"For our conversation is in heaven, from whence also we look for the Saviour, tlie 
Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like 
unto his glorious body." — Phil. iii. 20, 21. 

" Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many ; and unto them that look for 
him SHALL HE appear the second time, without sin unto salvation." — Heb. ix. 28. 

" WJien Christ who is our life shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in 
glory." — Col. iii. 4. 

" It doth not yet appear what we shall be ; but we know that when he shall 
appear, we shall be like him ; for we shall see him as he is."— 1 John iii. 2. 

"Ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for His 
Son FKOM HEAVEN, whom He raised from the dead."— 1 Thess. i. 9-10. 

" Ye come behind in no gift, waiting for THE COMING OF OUR LORD JESUS 
CHRIST."— 1 Cor. i. 7. 

" Be patient, therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord , . stablish 
your hearts, for THE COMING OF THE LORD draweth ni^/i."— James v. 7, 8. 

" That the trial of your faith being much more precious than of gold that 
perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise, and honour, and 
glory AT THE appearing of Jesus Christ . . . Wherefore, gird up the loins 
of your mind ; be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought 
unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ." — 1 Peter i. 7-13. 

" The Lord direct your hearts into the love of God, and into the patient waiting 
for Christ.'' — 2 Thess. iii. 5. 

" And the Lord make you to increase and abound in love, one toward another, and 
toward all men; even as we do toward you; to the end he may stablifch your 
Hearts unblamable in hoKness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our 
Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints."—! Thess. iii 12,13, 

" Keep this commandment without spot unrebukable, until the appearing of the 
Lord Jesus Christ." — 1 Tim. vi. 14. 

" And now, little children, abide in him, that ivhen he shall appear, we may have 
confidence, and not he ashamed before him at Ms coming." — 1 John ii. 28. 

"It is a righteous thing with God, to recompense tribulation to them that trouble 
you ; and to you who are troubled, rest with us, when the Lord Jesus shall be 
revealed from heaven with his mighty angels." — 2 Thess. i. 6, 7. 

" The Lord Jesus Christ who shall judge the quick and the dead, at his appearing 
and his kingdom. . . . Henceforth, there is laid up for me a crown 

of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day; 
and not to ma only, but unto all them also who love his appearing." — 2 Tim. iv. 1, 8. 

It is superfluous to comment upon these eloquent testimonies. Their 
scrupulous explicitness leaves no room for argument. They show that the 
hope of the early Christians was different from that of modern professors ; 
that it laid hold of the coming of the Lord as an object of personal solicitude. 
Jesus himself had exhorted them to be watchful : ^^ BeJiold, I come as a thief; 
Messed is he that watcheth.'' — (Rev. xvi. 15.) He had also said — 



277 

*'Take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts he overcharged with 
surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you 
unawares . . Watch ye, therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted 
worthy to escape all these things, and to stand before the Son of Man." — Luke xxi. 34-36. 

Now, in tlie professing Christian world of the present day, we see none of 
this anxiety about the second coming of Christ. There is a universal indiffer- 
ence to it. One is reminded of the statement in the parable ""Whilst the 
bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept," Very few care about the 
approach of the bridegroom ; very few believe in it. When spoken to about 
it, their language is practically that of the scoffers of whom Peter wrote, 
^' Where is the promise of his coming ? For since the fathers fell asleep, all 
things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation." Ah, but 
the day comes when this apathy shall be rudely dispelled. '• As a snare shall 
it come upon all them that dwell on the face of the whole earth," said Jesus 
(Luke xxi. 35). How is it that men are so blinded to the most obvious 
doctrine of the New Testament ? Because, under the guidance of a false theory, 
they look upon death as the eternal settlement of every man for weal and woe, 
whereas death settles nothing. It consigns us to darkness and silence, to 
await the coming of Christ. That is the great settling time " when God shall 
judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ. "--(Rom. ii. 16.) Blessed are all 
they who are prepared for its arrival. Happy are they who " look for his 
appearing ; " thrice happy they who "love it ; " for it is only to such that he 
is to " appear the second time unto salvation." O reader ! repent thee of thy 
worldly follies ! Give heed to the good message that speaks to thee out of 
thy Bible ! Learn the truth from its neglected pages, and casting thine errors 
and thy thoughtlessness behind thee, give obedience to the heavenly require- 
ments ; and then wait with hope for the coming of the Son of Man, that thou 
mayest be His in the day when he maketh up his jewels. 



278 



LECTURE X, 



THE HOFE OF ISRAEL; OR, THE RESTORATION OF THE JEWS, 
A FART OF THE DIVINE SCHEME AND AN ELEMENT OF 

THE GOSPEL, 

It will seem strange to most in these days, that any attempt should be made 
to prove a connection between the Christian hope and an event so local in its 
character as the restoration of the Jews to their own land (Palestine). 
Nevertheless, such is the object of the present lecture ; and it will be prosecuted 
on the same basis as those that have gone before, viz. : — regard for the 
testimony of the inspired Word of God in preference to learned opinion or 
venerable tradition. 

The interest taken by "Christians" as a body, in the Jews, is of a very 
weak and purely retrospective character. It arises from the history of the 
past — from the national relation of the Jews to the Deity in former times ; 
from their ancient mediumship as the channel of revelation ; and from their 
flesh-and-blood connection with the Messiah. It does not stretch into the 
future, except in the form of professed solicitation for the spiritual interests of 
the nation, in common with those of mankind in general. It recognizes no 
prospective indebtedness for the salvation to be manifested, but contents itself 
with musing on the incidents of the past, and thanking God for a future in 
which the Jew has no place. Now, we shall see before we get through this 
lecture, that the truth of God justifies an interest of a more practical kind than 
this. We shaU. find that in the purposes of God, the salvation of the world is 
bound up in the destinies of the Jews ; that apart from their national glori- 
fication, such salvation is a dream, to be realized neither \)j nations nor 
individuals, spiritually nor temporally, — and that the man, therefore, who is 
either ignorant or sceptical of this coming future development, is darkened in 
his understanding on one of the essential features of Christian teaching. 

Jesus said to his disciples " I am not sent liit unto the lost sheep of the 
house of Israeli (Matt. xv. 24). The sense in which he affirmed this, is evident 
from another statement : — " Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any 
city of the Samaritans enter ye not, but go rather to the lost shee}) of the house 
of Israel,'" He further declared to the woman of Samaria, at Jacob's well, 



279 

"Salvation is of the jews." — (John iv. 22). From these passages, the 
national restrictedness of the salvation proclaimed by Jesus and his apostles is 
at once apparent. Jesus vras a Jew, born in the house of David as the God- 
appointed heir of David's throne, and the apostles who laboured vidthhim were 
also Jews. They proclaimed a message which came from the God of the Jews, 
and which according to the original instructions of Christ, was only intended 
for the Jews. Therefore, Paul could emphaticaUy characterize the gospel as 
" THE Hope of Israel," which he did in the words recorded in Acts xxviii. 20, 
*' For the Hope of Israel I am bound with this chain." He could also make 
the following statement with peculiar emphasis, in defending himself before 
Agrippa : 

" And now I stand and am judged for the hope of the promise made of God unto our 
fathers; unto which promise our tivelve tribes, instantly serving God day and night, 
HOPE TO come; foe, which HOPE'S SAKE, King Agrippa, I am accused of the 
Jews."— Acts xxvi. 6, 7. 

He could also say with a truthfulness not generally appreciated. : — 

" My kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites, and to whom 'pertain the 
Adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and tlie service of 
Godi AND the promises."— Rom. ix. 8-4. 

Thus it is evident that the salvation proclaimed for acceptance in the gospel 

is intensely Jewish in its origin, its appKcation, and its future bearing ; and it is 

equally evident that this was the light in which it was regarded by the disciples 

after the day of Pentecost ; for we read in Acts xi. 19, that " They which were 

scattered abroad . . ♦ travelled as far as Phenice and Cyprus, and 

Antioch, 'preackbig the word to none hut unto the Jews only'^ The reader 

will also remember that Peter required a special revelation to instruct him as 

to God's proposed admission of the Gentiles into the blessings of Israel, and 

even then he threw the onus of it upon God. He did not attempt to justify 

it himself, but apologised to his brethren for preaching to the Gentiles, saying 

*' What was I, that I could withstand God ? " — (Acts xi. 17). The fact is, the 

admission of the Gentiles was one of the ''mysteries of the Gospel." Tliis 

is evident from the statement of Paul, in Ephesians iii. 5, 6 : 

" Ye may understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ, which in other ages 
was not made known unto the sous of men, as it is now revealed unto His holy- 
apostles and prophets by the Spirit: that the Gentiles should he fellow-heirs, and of the 
same body, and itartalccrs of his 'promise in Christ by the GospeU^ 

Put this opening the way for the admission of the Gentiles, did not destroy 

the Ii^raelitish character of "the hope." The effect was just the other way. 

Instead of the Gentiles converting the hope into Gentilism by their reception 

of it, the hope converted them into Jews, conforming them to its essentially 

Israelitish character. Hence, says Paul to those Ephesians who ^ecoi^•od it, 



280 

'*Ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel^ and 
strangers from the covenants of promise .... Now, therefore, 
ye are no more steangees and foeeignees, but fellow-citizens with the saints 
and of the household of God." — (Eph. ii. 12, 19.) He further said to the 
Romans, " He is a Jew which is one inwardly^' (Rom. ii. 29,) that is, he who 
being a Gentile by birth, has become a Jew in heart, and taste, and hope, is 
more of a real Jew than the reprobate natural son of Abraham. Referring to 
the admission of the Gentiles, he speaks of it as a cutting out of the olive 
tree which is wild by nature, and a grafting contrary to nature, into the good 
olive tree. — (Rom. xi. 24.) Hence the Gentiles are "wild olive branches" 
without hope — without birthright— without promises — without a future 
portion of any kind ; and if they would become heirs of the inheritance to 
come, they must cast off "the old man" of their Gentilism, and put on "the 
new man " of true Jewism, which is "renewed in knowledge after the image of 
Him that created him," — (Col. iii. 10.) 

But to come to a closer consideration of the subject : Paul says he was 
bound "for the hope of Israel," which is equivalent to saying that he preached 
it, seeing that it was for his preaching that he was put in bonds. Now if Paul 
proclaimed " the Hope of Israel," it is clear that he did not preach the set of 
ideas which now passes current in the popular churches as the Gospel ; for in 
what sense can they be said to be " the Hope of Israel ? " What hope has the 
Gospel of orthodoxy for them ? None. It promises them no special blessings 
in connection with its final development. On the contrary, it takes from them 
what hope they have. It tells them that their Messiah is not coming, and 
that their hopes of national reconstitution and aggrandisement under him in 
their own land, are carnal and delusive. Clearly, then, it cannot be the 
Gospel which Paul preached, for the one which he preached was *' the Hope 
of Israel." Its essential feature was to be recognised in a Jewish 
national hope, founded upon certain promises made of God to the progenitors 
of the nation. Those promises on which that hope was founded, constitute 
glad tidings, or Gospel proclaimed by Jesus and the apostles, for belief, and 
those who believed it derived a specific hope from the things so proclaimed. 
Now, as the one truly Christian hope arises from a reception of the doctrinal 
teaching of the Gospel, and since that is the basis of a Jewish national hojje, 
it must be very evident that there is an intimate connection between the 
Christian hope and the hope of Israel. It is the purpose of this lecture to 
point out that connection, and in the doing thereof, to introduce certain 
matters relevant thereto, which are essential to be known by all who desire to 
attain to the true knowledge of God. 

The Jews are a people whose origin and history are pretty well Jniown 



281 

among intelligent Scripture readers. Abraham, the member of a Chaldean 
family, was commanded to separate himself from his people, and go into a land 
'^which he should afterwards receive for an inheritance'^ — (Heb. xi. 8). He 
obeyed, and went out, " not knowing whither he went.'' He was afterwards 
informed that his descendants would become a great nation, with whom God 
should have special dealings, and who should be the special objects of His care. 
In the course of time, Abraham's household went down into Egypt, and 
settled in that country as a friendly colony. In the course of events, the 
Pharaohs enslaved them, and subjected them to a bitter rule for more 
than two centuries. At the end of that time, they were delivered through 
divine interposition by the hand of Moses ; and after various vicissi- 
tudes, they settled in the land of promise, under a divine constitution, 
which provided that so long as the nation was obedient to its requirements, 
they would remain in the land in prosperity, but that so soon as they departed 
from the statutes of the Grod who had called and constituted them, adversity 
would overtake them. The subsequent part of their history is summed up in 
a sentence ; they failed to observe the conditions of this national covenant, and 
were expelled from the national territory in disgrace, and scattered among the 
nations as fugitives, where they remain to this day. Now, the intelligence of 
ordinary professing Christians does not go beyond this general outline of the 
history of the Jews. They look upon Jewish national history as consummated, 
and the national destiny as irrevocably sealed. They take no cognizance of 
any future in store for them, as affecting the world's interest in any form. 
They think that if the Jews turn orthodox Christians, and become the disciplei:? 
of the missionaries sent to convert them, well, they may return to their land ; but 
whether they do or not, it is no matter. *' The Anglo-Saxons are the people 
leading the van — and destined to become the civilizers and enlighteners of the 
whole world. The Jews are nowhere ; they are behind the age, and will very 
likely be absorbed by the dominant people, who are rapidly fiUing the world 
with fruit." This is a prevalent sentiment ; and to suggest (as is done in the 
subject of this afternoon's lecture) that the salvation of the world is in any way 
beholden to the contemptible race of the Jews, is to incur the dis- 
pleasure of conceited patriotism, and the contempt and patronising pity of 
those who think themselves the wise of this generation. However, an intelli- 
gent regard for the Scriptures of truth, leads to different results. It enables 
one to see the foolishness of human proposings, and to recognise the wisdom of 
that divine disposition of events which is pourtrayedin the Scriptures of truth. 
The great Disposer has said " My thoughts are not as your thoughts, neither 
are my ways as your ways ; " and this principle wo sec illustrated in tho 
matter in hand. Human " ways " would have extirpated tho Jews from tho 



282 

earth centuries ago ; but the Higher ways have preserved them amid the fall 
of Gentile dynasties, and the annihilation of Gentile races ; and to this day 
they remain a distinct and indestructible people, though scattered among the 
nations of the earth. Human *' thoughts " have alienated the Jews as a nation 
from all further divine relationship ; but the Higher thoughts have decreed the 
destruction of every othor nation under heaven, and the eternal preservation of 
the despised nation of Israel in closest communion with the Highest. — (Jer. 
XXX. 11.) This will be brought into stronger prominence hereafter. Mean- 
while, the reader's attention is directed to the following testimonies regarding 
the national standing of the Jews before God : — 

" I the Lord am holy, and have severed you from other people, that ye should hD 
wiine."— Leviticus xx. 26. 

"Thou art a holy people unto the Lord thy God. The Lord thy God hath chosen 
thee to he a special people unto himself, above all people that are upon the face of tho 
earth.'' — Deut. vii. 6. 

" Thou art a holy people unto the Lord thy God; and the Lord hath chosen thee to 
be a peculiar people unto himself, above all the nations that are upon the earth.*' — 
Deut. xiv. 2. 

•' The Lord hath avouched thee this day to be His peculiar people, as He hath 
promised thee ; and that thou shouldest keep all his commandments, and to make 
thee high above all nations which he hath made, in praise, and in name, and in 
honour ; and that thou mayst be a holy people unto the Lord thy God." — Deut. 
xxvi. 18, 19. 

No language could more emphatically affirm the deliberate and unconditional 
selection by God of the Jews as a special people to Himself. The justice of 
such an arbitrary selection may be cavilled at, but cannot be denied ; and after 
all, what is such an objection but a presumptuous criticism upon the doings of 
the Deity, not at all warranted in the premisses ? Paul's reply to it is quite as 
philosophical as need be : " Hath not the potter power over the clay ? " Hath 
not the Eternal Creator, in His infinite wisdom, the most unquestionable right 
to develop His own plans in His own way ? The selection of the Jews is ono 
feature of the plan which He has conceived in relation to this world. This is 
incontestably proved by the testimonies adduced. Nothing can undo that 
selection. " The gifts and calling of God are without repentance." The Jews 
themselves cannot nullify the decree. Nothing- that they can do can alter their 
position before God as His chosen nation. Their actions may affect God's 
dealings toward them, but can never place them out of the pale of his special 
proprietorship. Even in the very punishments which they have endured for 
many generations, they show the speciality of their national character. " You 
only have I known of all the families of the earth; theeefoee / will i^unish 
you for all yow iniq^uities'' This is the language of Jehovah toward them iu 



283 

Amos iii. 2, and shows that the very calamities which have befallen them are 
proofs of divine supervision and dealing. At present, they are in dispersion, 
because of their iniquities, but not for ever cast off according to the common 
idea ; for Paul says, in Kom. xi. 2, " God hath not cast away His people 
v/hom He foreknew," The testimony of the prophets is still stronger. In 
Jeremiah xxx. 11, we read — 

"Though I make a full end of all nations whither I have scattered thee, yet 
ivill I not make a full end of thee ; but I will CORRECT thee in measure, and will not 
leave thee altogether unpunished." 

So that all the national calamities which have befallen them, and the 
indignity and exile they are still enduring, are but parts of the measured 
correction to which their Grod is subjecting- them, and not indications of a 
divine eternal reprobation. The language of Jehovah, in Jeremiah xxxiii. 24- 
26, would imply that some in ancient times took a contrary view, and 
contended, as many who call themselves Christians now do, that God had for 
ever disowned His people, and intended their destruction. The answer is 
sublimely emphatic : — 

" Considerest thou not what this people have spoken, saying, The two families 
v/hich the Lord hath chosen, He hath even cast them off. Thus they have despised 
my people, that tliey should be no more a nation before them. Thus saith the Lord, 
If my covenant he NOT toithday and night, and if I have NOT appointed the ordinances 
of heaven and earthy THEN will least away the seed of Jacobs and David my servant." 

Again in Micah iv. 11, 13, we read — 

"Now also many nations are gathered against thee, that say Let her be defiled, and 
let our eye look upon Zion. But they hnoiu not the thoughts of the Lord, neither 
understand they his counsel ; for He shall gather them (the nations) as the sheavea 
into the floor. Arise, and thresh, O daughter of Zion ; for I will make thine horn 
iron, and I will make thy hoofs brass, and thou shalt beat in pieces many people." 

Again, in Jeremiah li. 20 — 

" Thou art my battle-axe and weapons of war ; for loith thee will I break in pieces 
the nations, and with thee will I destroy kingdoms." 

These are the very words of the Almighty, which none can gainsay. They 
show us that though the Jews are now in a very feeble and degraded 
condition, they are destined to be the breakers of all Idngdoms under- heaven. 
So that even Britain herself, with all her national sensitiveness and pride, willhave 
to submit to them, or be shivered by the stone which shall then be made tlie hc^id 
of the corner. At present, the Jews are suffering as a punishment for their 
sins. This has already been made apparent. The maledictions of the prophets 
are numerous and fierce, and too well loiown to require quoting. Tlic evidonce oi 
their truthfulness is before our eyes. We see it in the dosolatt^ c^ondition of 
the- Holy Land, which, though once a thickly-peopled and thri\ii)g territory, 



284 

is now a silent and sterile waste. We see it in the wide-spread dispersion of 
the nation which was once the sovereign people of the world ; we behold it in 
the ignominy of their social position wherever they are to be found, and in the 
reproaches and insults which the mocking Gentiles heap upon them. Deep 
and heavy has been their draught of the cup of cursing and woe, at the 
hands of the Avenger. They cried "His blood be on us and on our 
children ; " and w4th blood and fire has their terrible invocation returned into 
their bosoms. But are there no brighter days for Israel? Are their 
calamities to have no end.? Is Jehovah's anger to bum against them for 
ever ? Let us hear the prophet : — 

" Thns saith the Lord, like as I have hrough* nil this great evil upon this people, so 
will I bring upon them ALL THE GOOD THAT I HAVE PROMISED THEM."— 
Jeremiah xxxii. 42. 

Here is a complete answer to the question. Its affirmation is that good will 
succeed the evil which is now upon them, which implies that the present time 
of national adversity will come to an end. Let it further be noted, that the 
good predicted is declared to have been "promised : " — "All the good ivhich I 
have promised themy Now the question immediately suggested by the 
consideration of this statement is " what good has been promised them .? " 
In answer to this, we read in Jeremiah xxxiii. 14, 16 : — 

" Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I will perform THAT GOOD THING 
which I have promised unto the house of Israel and to the house of Judah. In those days, 
and at that time, will I cause the Branch of Righteousness to grow up unto David : 
and he shaU execute judgment and righteousness in the land. In those days shall 
Judah be saved, and Jerusalem shall dwell safely." 

Here the "good thing promised" is briefly summarised. Its two main 
features are a king to execute judgment and righteousness in the land and the 
salvation of Judah and Jerusalem in, his day. This is neither more nor less 
than a promise of the Messiah to rescue them from theii* enemies, and to 
recover them from the oppressions to which they have been subject for ages, 
a promise which is repeated in the following words, in Ezekiel xxxvii. 22 :— 

" I will make them one nation in the land upon the mountains of Israel; and one 
king shall be king to them all ; and they shall be no more two nations." 

It is important to note the second element in the good thing promised : " /w 
his days Judah shall be saved, and Jerusalem shall dwdl safely.''^ It must be 
evident to the most obtuse intellect, that these days are yet to come : for, at 
present there is no Messiah executing judgment in the promised land, and no 
dwelling safely of Judah and Jerusalem, and never has there been such a 
state of things. Yet the promise is that this " good thing" shall " come to 
pass," with all the certainty of the evil v»hich has overtaken the nation; and 



285 

till:? promise is not confined to this part of Scripture, nor restricted to tliis 
language. We read in Jeremiah xxxi. 28 : — ■ 

" It shall come to pass, that like as I have watched over them, to pluck up, and to 
break down, and to throw down, and to destroy, and to afflict, so will I ivatch over 
them, to build and to plant, saith the Lord." 

This is to be in the days of the Eighteous Branch, when " he shall reign and 
prosper, and exercise justice and judgment in the earth;" for we find the 

following words in Jeremiah iii. 17, 18. 

"At that time, they shall call Jerusalem the throne of the Lord; and all the 
nations sliull be ^^athered unto it : to the name of the Lord, to Jerusalem, neither 
shall they walk any more after the imagination of their evil heart IK THOSE 
DAYS, the hcwe of Jvdoh fihall nail: 7n'th the house of Israel; and they shall come 
together out of the land of the north to the land that I have given for an inheritance unto 
your father. i.'^ 

We further read in Ezekiel xxxvii. 21 : — • 

" Thns saith the Lord God, Behold I will talce the children of Israel from among the 
heathen, whither they br. gone, and ivill gather them on every side, AND BEING TKE:?I 
INTO THEIR OWN LAND." 

Again in Ezekiel xxxvi. 24 : — 

" I loill talce you from among the heathen, and gather you out of all countries, and ivill 
bring you into your own land." 

There is no evading this language. It is too definitely worded to be 
spiritualized or misunderstood. As if to preclude such a thing, it is put iu the 
following antithetical mamier in Jeremiah xxxi. 10, — 

" Hear the word of the Lord, O ye nations, and declare it in the isles afar off. He 
that sCxVTTERED Israel will gather him, and keep him, as a shepherd doth his fock." 

In the sense, therefore, in which the Jews were scattered, will they be 
gathered. They were driven from their own land, and dispersed among the 
nations ; this was the scattering. They will be collected from the lands 
among which they are now distributed in disgrace, and re-settled in their land 
as a great nation ; this will be the gathering. Surely this is plain. Tlie Jews 
are now a taunt and a proverb, according to the prediction of Moses ; but in 
their restoration, it will just be the reverse. They will be supremely honoured 
in proportion as they are now contemned. We read in Zcph. iii. 1 9, 20. 

"Behold, at that time, I will undo all that afflict thee, and will save her thnthnltcth, 
and gather her that was driven out ; and I will get them praise and fame in every land 
zohere they have been put to shame. At that tinm will I bring you again, even in the 
time that I gather you ; for I will make you a name and a praise among all people of tha 
earth, when I turn back your captivity before your eyes, saith the Lora.'* 



286 

Again, Zechariali viii. 23, 

"Thus saith the Lord of hosts, In those days it shall come to pass that ten men 
Bhall take hold, out of all languages of th€ nations, even shall take hold of the 
slcirt of him that is « J^w, saying, We will go with you, for we have heard that God 
is with you*" 

This honour is connected with political supremacy. The Jews — the meanest, 
the weakest, the most despised people on the face of the earth, are to become 
the most powerful and renowned among the nations, having all people in 
perfect subjugation. This is evident from the following testimony : 

" The Gentiles shall eome to thy light, and kings to the brightness of th.y rising: 
* . * and the sons of strangers shall build up thy walls, and their kings shall mini- 
ster unto thee ; for in my wrath I smote thee, but in my favour have I had mercy on 
thee. Thereto! e, thy gates shall be open continually; they shall not be shut day 
nor night, that men may bring unto thee the forces of th^ Gentiles, and t^at their 
kings may be brought. For the nation and kingdom that will not serve thee, SHAXL 
PERISH; yea, those nations SHALL BE UTTERLY WASTED. 
The sons also of them that afiElicted thee shall come bending unto thee ; and all they 
that despised thee shall bow themselves down at the soles of thy feet ; and they -hall 
call thee the city of the Lord, the Zion of the Holy One of Israel. Whereas thou 
hast been forsaken and hated, so that no man went through thee, I will make thee an 
eternal excellency, a joy of many generations." — Isaiah Ix. 3, 10-12, 14-15. 

When this shall come to pass, the enemies of Israel will be confounded. 
Those who now deride them, and mock at their national hope, will be 
overtaken by the retributian to which they are rendering themselves liable. 
The approaching noontide of Jewish prosperity will be their destruction. The 
preliminary symptoms of the change will fill them with panic. This is the 
testimony of the following Scripture : — 

*' The nations shall see and be confounded ai all their might ; they shall lay their 
Aland upon their mouth ; their ears shall be deaf. They shaU lick the dust like a 
gerpent; they shall move out of their holes like worms of the earth; they shall be 
afraid of th-e Lord our God, and shall fear because of thee." — Micah vii. 16-17. 

And the fate they dread will overtake them, as is evident from the words of 
Isaiah, chap. xlix. 2-5-26 : — 

*' I will contend with him that contendisth with thee, and I will save thy children ; 
and I will feed them that oppress thee with their own flesh ; and they shall be 
. drunken with their own blood as with sweet wine ; and all flesh shall know that I, 
the Lord, am thy Saviour and thy Redeemer, the mighty one of Jacob." 

Again, m Isaiah xH. 11, 12, we read, — 

^' Behold all th^ that were incensed against thee shall he ashawted and confounded. 
'Ihey shall be as nothing; and they that strive with thee shall peeish. Thou 
'■^halt seek them and shalt not find them, even them that contended with thee. They 
ithat wei^ against thee shall be as nothing, and as a thing of nought." 

Here then is cert-ain doom for aH who fiow take part against Israel .; bu4 



287 

there is a blessing in store for tliose who befriend them. " Blessed is he that 
blesseth thee, and cursed is he that curseth thee." This was the decree 
pronounced by Balaam under the influence of the spirit, and declared to 
Abraham centuries before. It is both individual and national in its application, 
Nations that have been least rigorous in their persecutions of the Jews will, in 
all probability, fare the best at the coming of Christ, England is first among 
this class. She was among the persecutors of the chosen nation in the early 
part of her history ; but ^vithin recent centuries, she has loosened their bonds, 
^nd granted iiiem free protection to their persons and property, and latterly, 
she has abolished their disabilities, and promoted them to the rank of citizen- 
ship, and even admitted them to Parliament. Individuals who have looked 
with interest and compassion upon the exiled race may expect a blessing when 
the scoffer's brazen voice is heard no more. 

We look upon the Jews in their present reprobate position, and find them 
destitute of all that is lovely or admirable. They seem the embodiments of 
sordidness and dishonesty. This is a difficulty in the case, at which many honest 
minds stumble. It arises, however, from a misapprehension,. The mind 
previously unacquainted with the subject, naturally supposes that the restoration 
of the Jews will in some sense be conditional upon the moral condition of the 
nation. This, however, is a mistake. Restitution takes place altogether 
independent of Jewish deservings. This is very explicitly stated in Ezekiel. 
xxxvi. 22, 32. 

^^ I do not tins for your sakes, O house ol Irsa^l, hut for mine holy name's salce^ 
which ye have profaned among the heathen whither ye wentJ'^ '■'■Not for your sakes do I 
this, saith the Lord God, be it known unto you; be ashamed and confounded for your 
own ways, O house of Israel." 

At the same time, though national restoration as a purpose of God is not 
contingent upon national reformation, yet a severe moral test will be applied 
before a settlement in the land takes place. Though they wiU be gathered 
from the countries irrespectively of moral condition, they will not necessarily 
obtain admission into the land. That admission is conditional with everj 
individual of the nation. This is evident from Ezekiel xx, 34-38 : — 

" I «v^ll bring you out from the people, and will gather you out of the countries 
wherein ye are scattered, with a mighty hand, and with stretched-out arm, and with 
fury poured out; and I will bring you into the wilderness of the people, and thcra 
will I plead with you face to face. Like as I pleaded with your fatliors in the 
wilderness of the land of Egypt, so wiU I plead with you, saitli the Lord God. And f 
will cause you to pass under the rod, and I will bring you into the boKd of the cotyenant, 
and I WILL PURGE OUT FROM AMONG YOU THE REBELS AND TKEM 
THAT TRANSGRESS AGAINST ME. I will bring them forth out of the couuky 
wher« they sojoi,^a:n,, and ihey shall -not ente^- into the laud of Isjoel.'* 



288 

In this we recognize a parallel to the process to which the nation was 
subjected, after lea\dng Egypt under Moses. They were then a rabble of 
untutored, unbelieving slaves ; and a whole generation, with the exception of 
two persons — Caleb and Joshua — perished in the wilderness. They '* entered 
not in, because of unbelief," says Paul (Heb. iv. 6.) So the Jews contemporary 
with the return of Chiist, will be unfit to enter the land ; the event will find 
them in their present degraded and perverse condition ; and the purging 
described in the testimony above will be necessary. That purging will take 
place in the wilderness, as in the days of Moses, and will require about the 
same period for its accomplishment, as is stated in Micah vii. 15 : '' Accordhig 
to the days of thy coming out of the land of Egypt ^ will I show unto him 
marvellous things." Afterwards, will the following testimonies be fulfilled : — 

"Then shall ye remember your own evil ways, and your doings that were not 
good ; and shall loathe yourselves in v our own sight, for your inicLuities and for your 
abominations." — Ezekiel xxxvi. 31. 

" TJiy people also shall he all righteous ; they shall inherit the land for ever, the 
branch of my planting, the work of my hands, that I may be glorified." — Isaiah Ix. 21. 

It is sometimes objected that Palestine is too small to hold all the Jews that 
have ever lived. The objection, however, proceeds on the erroneous supposition 
that previous generations of Israel, according to the flesh, will be resurrected 
for restoration. We have no reason to suppose that there will be such a 
resTUTection. The promised restoration is restricted to the generation contem- 
poraneous with the advent of the Messiah ; and perhaps even they will only be 
gathered to perish in the wilderness, hke their forefathers in the days of the 
first exodus. Some may think that there is a kind of partiality and injustice 
in this exclusion of previous generations from the national restoration ; but 
this is only a short-sighted view of the case. There is no injustice done to 
previous generations, for we must remember that the Jews are God's people 
ooily in a national sense. They are His nation, whom He has chosen out of all 
other people on the face of the earth. He has not selected them with a viev/ 
to special benefit individually. In respect of the salvation to be conferred 
through Christ, they are on equal footing with the G-entiles ; yet nationally, 
their relationship to God is very special, as will be made manifest in the 
future age. 

Now from the testimony advanced, we learn — 

1. — That the Jews are God's chosen nation. 

2. — That they are the repository of God's promises. 

3. — That they are dispersed at present as a punishment for their iniquities. 

4. — That they are to be restored from their dispersion, and reinstated as a 
people in their o-^-n land. 



289 

5. — That all the enemies of Isra&l are to bo destroyed, and 
6.— That the remnant of the nations are to become subject to the restored 
kingdom of Israel, and to repair periodically to Jerusalem to do homage to the 
King of all the earth, and to learn his ways. 

This is a summary of the things constituting " the hope of Israel," for which 
Paul was bound with chains ; and who can fail to perceive that they are also 
the bases of the Christian hope as set forth in previous lectures ? the hope of 
the Christian is the coming of Christ, and the establishment of the kingdom of 
God, involving the restoration of Israel. The hope of the Jew is the coming 
of Christ and the establishment of the kingdom of God. Hence their hopes are 
identical, so that Paul was justified in characterizing the gospel as " the hope 
of Israel." That gospel was in reality a proclamation of a coming re-establii^h- 
ment of the kingdom of Israel under the "-greater than Solomon," and an 
invitation to all to become partakers of Israel's glory, on certain specified 
conditions. It was essentially " the hope of Israel." No one, therefore, can 
scripturally understand the kingdom of God, which is the Christian hope, who 
is ignorant of the prophetic teaching concerning the restoration of the Jews, 
for that restoration is a most essential element in its establishment. Were it 
omitted, no kingdom of God could be set up in the future age. Yet a certain 
class of well-meaning persons are zealously opposed to the doctrine. Taking 
their stand upon certain statements in the New Testament, they maintain, 
with great tenacity, that the restoration of the Jews is impossible. Now, we 
may accept it as a first principle, that any new Testament deduction which is 
diametrically opposed to the plain statements of the prophets, is erroneous , 
for the T\T:iters of the New Testament said " none other things than those 
which the prophets and Moses did say should come," (Acts xx^d. 22,) and 
appealed to them as their authorities. There can be no contradiction in 
wi'itings dictated by one and the same eternal spirit ; and, in fact, there is 
none. The New Testament arguments against the restoration of Israel, are 
all based on misconceptions of the statements on which they are founded. 
One of these is Bom. ix. 6, 7. — 

" They are not all Israel which are of Israel; neither becanse they are the seed of 
Abraham are they all children; but in Isaac shall thy seed be called. That is, they 
which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God ; but the 
children of iiromise are counted for the seed.'' 

Now this statement is in strict agreement with the prophets, without in any 
way diminishing the force of their teaching in reference to the speciality of 
the Jews as a nation, and their future natural restoration. It is dhso/utrli/ 
true that all of Israel are not Israel — that thousands of tlie seed of Abrnh;nu 
are ;^o^ ciiiLDEEN — and that the divine x^rinciple is to count "tlic childn^u of 



290 

the promise " for the seed ; and tliis is exempHfied individually and nationally. 
In the case of the Jews, requirements, such as circumcision, sacrifice, reverence 
for the name of God, and numberless other things specified in the law, were 
laid down as conditions of citizenship in the nation, and transgression was 
visited with expulsion. The penalty attached to almost every statute was, 
*'^That sold shall be cut of:f from his peojjle.'*' Transgressors, therefore, 
though of Israel were not Israel^ even under the law. A whole generation of 
such non-Israelites perished in the wilderness ; but this did not nullify the 
national election of the seed of Abraham (through Isaac). It only showed 
that fleshly descent frcm Abraham did not of itself constitute accepted 
Israeliteship — that it required Abraham's faith as well as Abraham's blood. 
Yet fleshly descent was necessary, as no G-entile could become a party to the 
national covenant, except by abandoning Gentilism, and submitting to circum- 
cision, and all the other requirements of the law ; and thus proclaiming his 
recognition of Jewism as the basis of divine pri^ilege. 

Individually, as well, in reference to the heirship of the kingdom, "the 
children of the promise are counted for the seed." No fleshly son of Abraham 
has a natural title to the honour, glory, and immortality of the kingdom, 
covenanted. These are reserved for a class developed on the principle of 
believing the ^>>?'^w?y5^5. In this respect "the flesh profiteth nothing;" and 
even in respect of moral citizenship, it profiteth nothing, for, as we have seen, 
that privilege is not to be granted on mere fleshly title. '* I will bring you 
nnder the bond of the covenant, and purge out from among you the rebels.'* 
This is the prophetic declaration. Thousands of Jews will be gathered from 
the countries who v/ill never enter the land. Yet this will not destroy their 
national relationship. Being Jews, whom God has specially chosen as a nation, 
with a view to the development of His ultimate purpose, they will everyone 
be gathered in the preliminary restoration. This is the declaration of Moses, 
who says — 

*' If any of thine be driven ont unto the outmost parts of heaven, from thence 
will the Lord thy God gather thee, and from thence will He fetch thee." — Dcut. xxx. 4. 

Isaiah gives similar testimony, he says — 

" He shall set up an ensign for the nations, and slxaU assemble the outcasts of 
Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earthJ* 
(chap. xi. 12.) " And it shall come to pass in that day, that the Lord shall beat 
oflF from the channel of the river unto the stream of Egypt ; and ye shall be gathered 
ONE BY oxE, O ye children of Israel." — chap xxvii. 12. 

Thus there wiU be an indiscriminate national restoration without any 
reference to moral condition, just as in the case of the tribes when delivered 
from Egypt by the hand of Moses ; because the nation, as a whole, is God's by 



291 

sovereign election, and cannot alienate themselves from that relation, though 
they may be rehellious, and render themselves obnoxious to His destroying- 
judgments. Yet having been thus indiscriminately gathered, they are not at, 
once settled in the land, but like their forefathers in the day that they cam© 
out of the land of Egypt (see testimony already quoted from Ezekiel xx), are 
subject to an expurgating process in the wilderness, from which none who 
are morally unfit for the privilege of citizenship under the Messiah, shall 
escape* " They shall come from the land where they sojourn, but shall not 
enter into the land of JsraeV Thus even in the future national restoration of 
the Jews, the mere children of the fllesh are not counted for the seed, but those 
of faith who shall be developed by the probation in the T^ilderness. It must 
then be obvious that it is a very short-sighted construction of Paul's words,, 
indeed, which would destroy the doctrine of Jewish national restoration. It 
is a construction to which he himself would strenuously object, were he now 
alive ; for he has left his mind on the subject on record. Speaking of his 
^'Idnsmen according to thejlesh^ who are Israelites" (Horn. ix. 3), he says — - 

" Blindness in part ia happened to Israel, "UNTIL the fulness: of the Gentiles- be c&me 
in ; and so all Israel shall be saved ; as it is written, There shall come out of Zion 
the Deliverer^ and shall turn away ungodliness /rom Jacob. . . As touching the 
election, they aeij beloved for the Father's sake ; for the gifts and calling of 
God are without repentance . . . If ijie fall of them be the riches ot the world, 
and the diminisj|ing of them the riches of the Gentiles, how much more their 
fulness? If the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world, what 
SHALL THE, RECEIVING OF THEM be hut life from the dead,} "—Rom. xi. 25, 26, 
28, 12, 15. 

Here Paul contemplates an approaching Jewish ^'fulness,'' ''a receiving 
again," "a national change," ''when the fulness of the G-entiles be come in," 
and warns the Gentiles in view of this, not to boast against the Jews in the 
wisdom of their own conceit (verse 25). This lets us into Paul's views on tho 
subject of the restoration of the Jews, and shows the folly of those who 
construe some of his words into an opposite conclusion. The prophets and 
Moses as we have seen, foretel the glorious restoration and national restitution 
of the veritable nation that has suffered the vengeance of the Ahiiiglity for 
nearly twenty centuries. How then could Paul, who spake none other things 
than they (Acts xxvi. 22), inculcate piinoiples entirely subversive of their 
teaching ? Impossible ! It is only partial knowledge or positive ignorance that 
leads men to erect a system of doctrine on the New Testamont thnt contradicts 
the plainest testimonies of the " holy men of old, who spake as ilu^y wero 
moved by the Holy Ghost." 

There are other objections frequently urged of an equally basoh^ss naturo, but 
the limited space at disposal prevents the notice of thi'm. Jaumi^h has been 



292 

said to show that the restoration of Israel is one of tlie main features of the 
divine purpose to be dovelo]3ed in the future — that the kingdom of God cannot 
be established without its accomplishment, and that, in fact, it is the great event 
on which the world's salvation depends. " Salvation is of the Jews," nationally 
and individually. It is important, then, to understand this element of tke 
truth of God, that by our enlightenment, we may be enabled to put off 
Geiitilism, and become related to a higher polity — even the commonwealth of 
Israel — in which, being "ylZ/ra/i^wi '5 sced^ we shall be " heiks accoeding to 

TnE PEOMISE." 



LECTURE XL 



COiriXG TROUBLES AND THE SECOND ADVENT, 

The subject of this afternoon's lecture is one that has no particular charm for 
the g'cnerality of mankind. Men do not like to think of coming judgment. 
It is not congenial to their tastes. They prefer to believei^hat the world will 
gradually hush into millennial tranquillity, without any distui-bance of the 
existing order of things. A fatal delusion, which has lulled into slumber the 
" wi^e " generation of this " enlightened " nineteenth century ! — the scriptural 
I)resage of the awful judgment-storm which is about to descend upon this 
miserable, God-contemning, self-conceited world ! for we read that a prelimin- 
ary indication of the " sudden destruction " coming, will be the cry of ''Peace ! 
jDcace I " 

It is purposed to show, this afternoon, that a belief in coming troubles, as 
the preciii'sors of Christ's approaching manifestation on earth in power and 
great glory, is not the concomitant of insanity, nor the result of fanatical 
tendency ; but the inevitable consequence of practical faith in the Bible as the 
revealed will of G od. Any imputation therefore, arising from such a belief, 
must be directed against the Bible, and not against the subject of the belief; 
for there is a marked difference between gratuitous fancy, and intelligent 
couAdction arising from credence accorded to any authority. One is responsi- 
ble for any teaching proceeding from the former, but not for any resulting 
from the latter. 

In former lectures, we have seen that it is the purpose of God to send Jesus 
Clnist to the earth again for the purpose of destroying all kingdoms that exist, 



293 

and setting up a kingdom of Ms own that will be universal and never-ending. 
The question that now demands our attention is, what are to be the circum- 
stances attendant upon this prodigious change in the world's history ? How 
is the breaking to be effected ? Will the change from the kingdom of men to 
the kingdom of God be instantaneous, or the slow result of universal judgment? 
Will Clu-ist steal upon the earth in a time of peace, and quietly decimate the 
powers of the earth, with their armies, in a single night, as m the case of the 
Assyrians in the days of old ? or, will he be manifested when wars are rife, 
and troubles abroad ? The testimony is very explicit on this point : — 

At that time, " there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was 
A nation even to that same time." — Dan. xii. 1. 

Josus, in allusion to the same crisis, says — 

"Upon the earth shall be distress of nations with perplexity; the sea and the 
waves roaring ; men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things 
which are coming upon the earth " — Luke xxi. 25-26. 

And we find the following language in Jeremiah xxv. 32, 33, in reference to 
the same time : — 

•'Thus saith the Lord of Hosts, Behold, evil shall go forth from nation to nation, 
and a -great whirlwind shall be raised up from the coasts of the earth. And the 
sLnn of the Lord shall be at that day, from one end of the earth even to the other 
end of the earth." 

These testimonies answer the question. They show that the change which 
will introduce the kingdom of God on earth will be accompanied by troubles 
on a scale which has not yet had a parallel in history ; that the whole world 
Vidll be inextricably involved in political difiiculties, and suffer from the many 
evils incident to such a condition. This is a kind of trouble with which the 
v/orld is familiar in some shape already. Political entanglements, disastrous 
w irs, commercial embarrassment, and the endless social troubles that follow in 
their train, are matters of historic experience, and not peculiar to *'the end.'* 
1h se will, however, prevail at that time in their most aggravated forms. We 
sLa'-l find that another element of trouble will characterise the times of the 
second advent, — that God himself will operate in visible judgment upon the 
infatuated nations of the earth, — that natural perplexities will be supplemented 
by miraculous retributions. The testimonies to this effect are numerous and 
emphatic ; and as the entire argument hinges upon them, they deserve tlie 
most thoughtful consideration. We read in Jeremiah xxv. 30, 31, — 

"Therefore prophesy thou against them all these words, and say unto them, The 
Lord shall roar from on higli, and utter His voice from His holy habitation; Ho 
shall mightily roar upon His habitation. He shall give a shout as they that tread 
the grapes, against all the inhabitants of the earth. A noise shall come even to tho 
ends of the earth ; fur the Lord hath a controversy with the nations; He will tlead 
WITH allfeshi He will give ihem that are wicked to the sword.'* 



294 

Here is a direct pleading with "all flesh," on the part of" the Almighty 
predicted, and the extirpation of the wicked from among men. History 
supplies no record of such an awful transaction. The prediction is clearly 
unfulfilled. The time of its accomplishment -will appear from the next 
testimony. 

•' Behold the name of tlie Lord cometh feom far, burning with his anger, and the 
burden thereof is heavy: Ms lips are full of ini>ignation, and his tongue as a 
devouring fire; and his breath as an overflowing stream, shall reach to the midst of 
the neck, to sift the nations with the sieve of vanityj' — Isaiah xxx. 27-28. 

Who is "the name of the Lord " personified m this quotation from Isaiah? 
The answer is, — It is he who said, " I am come in 7ny Father's name (John 
V. 43), and of whom it is written, "There is none other name given under 
heaven among men, whereby we must be saved ; " viz., Jesus the Christ, th© 
anointed of God, who is to us Emmanuel — God-with-us — the "Word made flesh 
— a name of God provided for the investiture of the naked sons of men. The 
prophecy represents him as "coming fro^i far." What is the meaning of 
this ? "We fijid it explained in Christ's parable to his disciples, which is 
recorded in Luke xix. 12-27. — " A certain nobleman went into a far country to 
receive for himself a kingdom, and to return." Hence, Jesus (the nobleman)^ 
returning from heaven (the far country), is " the name of the Lord coming, 
from far.'' Now in what character is he revealed, according to the prophecy ? 
"His lips are full of indignation, and his tongue as a devouring fire." Or 
take Paul's representation : " The Lord Jesus shall he revealed from heaven, 
with his mighty angels in flaming fire^ taking vengeance on them that know 
not God, and that obey not the gosjJel of our Lord Jesus Christ;'' which is in. 
agreement with the statement in Isaiah xi. 4: " He shall smite the earth with 
the rod of his mouth: with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked J* 
Finally we contemplate the picture symbolically elaborated in Rev. xix. 11-16* 

"And I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse; and he that sat on him 
was called Faithful and True; and. in righteousness he doth judge and make war. 
His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head were many crowns; and he had a 
NAME WRITTEN that no man knew but he himself; and he was clothed with a 
vesture dipped in blood; and his NAME is called the WORD OF GOD. And the 
armies which were in heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, 
• white and clean; and out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it he should 
sviite tlie nations; and he shall rule them with a rod of iron; and he treadeth the loine- 
press of the fierceness and wrath of the Almighty God. And he hath on his vesture, 
and on his thigh a name written. King of Kings and Lord of Lords." 

Having seen that "the name of the Lord coming from far, burning with hia 
anger," answers to the approaching advent of Christ to take vengeance, it wiU 
be profitable to cite other testimonies to show that this doctrine of coming 






i 



295 

judgment is the uniform teaching of the Spirit in the word, and not a mere 
inference from some isolated expression. We read in Isaiah Ixyi. 15, 16, — 

"Behold, the Lord will come with fire, and with his chariots, like a whirlwind, to 
render his anger with fury, and his rebuke with flames of fire. For hy fire and hy his 
sword will the Lord plead with all fluh; and THE SLAIN OF THE LORD SHALL. 
BE MANY." 

Again, Psalm 1. 3-6, — 

" Our God shall come and shaU not keep silence: afire shall devou/r "before him, and 
it shall be very tempestuous round about him. He shall call to the heavens from above, 
and to the earth, that he may judge his people. Gather my saints together unto me-, 
those that have made a covenant with me by sacrifice. And the heavens sh.aU 
declare his righteousness; for God is judge himself." 

Further, in Malachi iv. 1, 2, we find the following emphatic declaration: — 

"Behold the day cometh that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, all 
that da wickedly, SHALL BE STUBBLE; and the day that cometh shall BURN 
THEM UP, saith the Lord of Hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branchu. 
But unto you that fear my name shall the Sun of Righteousness arise with healing 
in his wings." 

To a similar purport is the statement in Jeremiah xxx. 23, 24, — 

"Behold the whirlwind of the Lord shall go forth with fury — a continuing 
whirlwind: it shall fall with pain upon the head of the wicked. The fierce auger of the 
Lord shall not return until he hath done it, and until he h.ath performed the intents 
of his heart; IN THE LATTER DAYS ye shall consider it." 

Again, Psalm xxi. 9, — 

"Thou shalt make them {his enemies) as a fiery oven in the time of thine anger; 
the Lord shall swallow them up in his wrath j and the fire shall devour them." 

"Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and a horribla 
tempest; this shall be the portion of their cup " — Psalm xi. 6. 

" And I will send a fire on Magog, and among them that dwell carelessly ii> tho 
Isles: and they shall know that I am the Lord*" — ^Ezekiel xxxix. 6. 

" And the slain of the Lord shall be at that day from one end of the earth even unto 
the other end of the earth. They shall not be lamented, neither gathered, aor 
buried. They shall be dung upon the ground."— Jeremiah xxv. 33. 

Surveying these testimonies as a whole, we find that they reveal two separate 
stages in the " coming troubles." Pirst there is " distress of nations," — '^'evil 
going forth from nation to nation," — and " men's hearts failing for fear," <fcc., 
— which may be designated the natural stage ; and second, a divine manifest- 
ation in the person of the Son of Man (who is "the name of the Lord^") 
accompanied by sweeping judgments of fire and sword which will destroy 
large masses of our corrupt race ; which may be considered as the supornatunil. 
The former precedes the latter. Plence, as the first indication of the a})proach 
of the end, we must look for timea of trouble and commotion on the earth. 



296 

International politics will become complicated beyond the possibility of 
tmravelment ; a universal war- spirit will be evoked ; general outbreak of war 
will ensue, and with this, commerce vnll become embarrassed ; trade fettered ; 
eraplojTnent precarious ; distrust will fill society ; panic will spread ; trade 
bankruptcies will follow in quick succession ; and the social fabric will be 
shaken to the foundation, if not involved in ruin and reduced to chaos. Events 
T\T.ll stride vdth rapid march, and anon, the superhuman will enter the scene. 
The Lord Jesus will be revealed, no longer as " the Lamb slain from the 
foundation of the world " — "the man of sorrow and acquainted with grief," 
but as "the Lion of the tribe of Judah, treading the winepress of the fierce- 
ness of the wrath of Almighty God," — taking vengeance on this conceited, 
faithless, unbelieving g-eneration that boast of themselves of great light, when 
lo I they are shrouded in a pall of Eg^^ptian darkness ; and think themselves 
rich in their own shabby phrenological ^4rtue, when lo I they are "wretched, 
and poor, and miserable, and blind, and naked," despising the righteousness 
which Grod has provided in Christ Jesus ^^ through faith." The vengeance in 
relation to mankind as a whole will be destruction to the majority, and 
discipline to the remnant. Multitudes will perish by war and pestilence ; 
multitudes more will fall victims to the fire which will descend after the 
manner of the judgments upon Sodom and Gomorrah, and the flames that 
consumed the military companies that went to bring Elijah from the top of the 
mount. " The slain of the Lord shall be many from one end of the earth even 
to the other end of the earth." The earth's population will be greatly thinned ; 
its reprobate elements expurgated, leaving a residue composed of the meek and 
submissive, and well-disposed of manldnd, who will constitute the willing 
subjects of Messiah's kingdom, referred to in Isaiah ii. 3; Jeremiah iii. 17; 
Micah iv. 2; and Zechariah xiv. 16, as the nations which shall go up "to the 
house of the God of Jacob," at Jerusalem, to learn of His ways, and walk in His 
paths, walking no more after the imagination of their evil hearts. 

But this result will not be at once developed. The subjugation of the world 
is a matter of time. When Christ comes, the powers wiS colleague themselves 
against him. This is evident from Rev. xix. 19. — "I saw the beast, and the 
kings of the earth, and the armies gathered together to mal-e vjnr against Mm 
that sat on the horse, and against his army." This is after his descent from 
heaven (see Averse 11). It may be thought incredible that nations should be so 
infatuated as to attempt to oppose the movements of omnipotence. The answer 
is, that what has been may be again. The Egj-ptians did not succumb before 
the unmistakable evidence of divine working, but madly pursued Israel after 
they left Egypt, and came to perdition in the Red Sea. it is not at allj 
improbable that the powers on the Continent may look upon Christ as somel 



297 

new Mahomet — some fanatical caliph, bent upon the project of universal 
conquest. Under this impression they will combine to put him down ; but 
their misguided efforts will recoil upon their own heads to their destruction. 

"The nations shall rush like the rushing of many waters, but God shall rebuke 
them; and they shall flee afar off; and shall be chased as the chaff of the mountains 
before the wind ; and like thistledown before the whirlwind. Behold at eventide 
trouble ; and before the morning he is not! " — Isaiah xvii. 13-14. 

" He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh : the Lord shall have them in derision. 
Then shall He speak unto them in His wrath, and vex them in His sore displeasure." 
— Psalm ii. 4-5. 

"The Lord at thy right hand shall strike through kings in the day of His wrath. 
He shall judge among the heathen; He shall fill the places with dead bodies. He 
Bhall wound the heads over many countries." — Psalm ex. 5-6. 

"It shall come to pass in the day that the Lord shall punish the host of the high 
ones that are on high, and the kings of the earth upon the earth. They shall 
be gathered together as prisoners are gathered into the pit, and shall be shut up in 
prison (viz., the grave: ^ech. ix, 11); and after many days shall they be found 
wanting. THEN shall the moon be confounded, and the sun ashamed, when the 
Lord of Hosts shall reign in mount Zion and in Jerusalem, and before His 
ancients gloriously." — Isaiah xxiv. 21-23. 

" The adversaries of the Lord shall be broken to pieces; out of heaven shall He 
thunder upon them (then the sequel). The Lord shall judge the ends of the earth, 
and He shall give strength to His king, and exalt the horn of His anointed (or Christ)." 
— 1 Samuel ii. 10. 

Also, let Zeph. iii. 8, and Haggai ii. 6, 22, be consulted, as well as other 
Scriptures which may be found on search. Thus the attempt on the part of 
the " constituted " powers to resist the new-risen Eastern monarch, will result 
in their utter discomfiture. Their audacity will meet with terrible retribution. 
The entire system of human government which they represent will be shivered 
to atoms, and the invincible autocracy of the G-reater than Solomon wall be 
asserted and universally established. This, however, will not be accomplished 
in an instant. God could annihilate the power of the enemy in a moment, and 
at once clear the ground for the erection of His own power in the earth ; but 
there would then be no scope for the intended punishment of this wicked world, 
and no depth in the moral effect upon " the remnant." God could at once have 
destroyed the Egyptians and liberated the captive Israelites ; but then the 
lesson Vv^hich was intended to be wrought for all time would not have been 
graven sufficiently deep ; the Jews would have carried away but an indistinct 
idea of the greatness and omnipotence of Jehovah ; the historical name of God, 
which is one of the buttresses of our faith, would have been weak and ill- 
remembered. The divine workings are always characterized by comprehen- 
siveness of aim, and it is only ignorance of the purpose that engenders 
eoiitempt for the meajis, In the collision, then, which ^^'iIL take place at the 



298 

end, between the powers of this world and Christ, the man whom Gi-od hath 
appointed to judge the world in righteousness, man will be allowed to go his 
length, and to put forth his power in the vain attempt to vanquish unsuspected 
omnipotence. This will give time for the moral operation of the judgmentj 
which will be brought to bear in their suppression. 

"WHEN thy judgments are in the eai-th, the mhahitants -rf the world will learn 
R-igliteousness." — Isaiah xxvi. 9 

"All nations shall come and worship before Thee; for Thy Judgments are made 
manifest.'' — Rev. xv. 4. 

Many laborious campaigns will probably take place before complete 
subjugation is effected. The governments of the earth wdll struggle with 
desperation to preserve the human regime from threatened annihilation. They 
will fight to the last, and T\dll hope till expiring hope goes out in the complete 
triumph of the Lamb "who shall overcome them," During the interval which 
wHL thus be occupied, a righteous and submissive people will be developed by 
means of the judgment mxanifested, who will be glad to hail the inauguration 
of the new government, which will be universally established upon the ruins 
of "the kingdoms of this world." 

What will be the position of Christ's own people at this crisis, those who 
now and in all ages have "looked for his appearing," being " like unto men 
waiting for the Lord ? " It is clear that they are not left among the nations 
during this dreadful time of trouble ; they are with " the Lamb," as is evident 
from Rev. xvii. 14: "These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb 
shall overcome them ; for he is Lord of Lords and King of Kings, and ihcy 
that are with him are called, and chosen, and faithf?il." Who are "they that 
are with him .? " The answer appears in the next testimony: "The Lord 
God shall come, and all the saints with him.'" — (Zech. xiv. o.) The saints 
co-operate with Christ in executing the judgments written. This h-onour is in 
reserve for them all. It will be their privilege " to execute vengeance upon the 
heathen and punishments upon the people ; to bind their kings with chains, 
and their nobles with fetters of iron ; to execute upon them the judgment 
written : this honour have all his saints." — (Psalm cxlix. 5-9.) This 
"honour" will be sustained at the time contemplated in the words of Daniel, 
chap. vii. 22: " Jtjdg^ient was given to the saints of the Most High; and the 
time came that tJie saints possessed the kingdom.'^ Paul reminds the 
Corinthians of this approaching- elevation of the saints to the judgment seat : 
■*'Do ye not know that the saiTits shall jndge the world ? and if the world shall 
be judged by yc^u, are ye unwoTthy to judge the smallest matters ? Know ye 
fflLOt that we shall judge angels 2 How much more things that pertain to this 



299 

life P "-(1 Con vi. 2, 3). It is also seen by John in vision, as recorded in Rev. 
XX 4: I saw thrones, and they that sat upon them, and judgment ,vas ylven 
unto t/iem^ ^ 

Thus it i. oWons that in the closing judgmeiit-scenes of this dispensation 
the saints will be consociated with the Lord Jesus in destroying the corrupt 
pohtical, ^clesiastical, ai.d social systems which aggregately constitute "this 
present ewl world." This is a work of devastation for which the mere relicnous 
sentimentalists of this age would be unfit. It wiU involve much destruction of 
life after the wholesale example of the flood, and develop a time of trouble 
such as never has been witnessed since there w^s a nation on earth,--a day of 
darkness and gloominess-a day of clouds and thick darkness-the great and 
dreadful day of the Lord." Wide-spread wiU be the desolations produced; 
bloody and scathing the judgments ministered at the hands of Jesus and the 
saints. "The lofty looks of man shall be humbled; and the haughtiness of 
men shall be bowed down; and the Lord alone shaU be exalted in that day • 
for the day cf the Lord of Hosts shaU be upon ^very one that is proud and lofty' 
and upon every one that is lifted up, and he shall be brought low 
They shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth for 
fear of the Lord, and for the glory of His majesty, when He ariseth to shake 
terribly the earth."— (Isaiah ii. 11, 12, 19.) 

It must be obvious, then, that before this judgment period commences, the 
saints will be removed from the spheres which they occupy in the world- 
■otherwise they would not be with Christ, and would be involved in the general 
troubles, which is contrary to the words in which they are addressed .:i 
-Isaiah xxvi. 20-21 : — 

" Come, my people, enttr thou into thy cUavihers, and sh^it thy doors about thee • hid « 
thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast; for behold 
the Lord Cometh out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their 
-".niquity; the earth alsu shall disclose her blood, and no more cover her slain." 

The mode of this "entering into the chamber, and shutting the door " to 
liide, is made apparent in the New Testament ; fii'st, by reference to Matt, 
XXV. 10, where we read "They that were ready went in with him to the 
marriage, and the door was shut-,'' ajid second, by reference to Rev, xix. 7. .s 
where we find that this marriage is the re-union between Christ and liis 
people at his coming. This is further manifest from the teacliiiig oi Paul iu 
1 Thess.iY. 16, 17:— 

" The Lord himself shall descend from heaven with n shout, with the voice of tho 
archangel, and with the trump of God; and tho dead in Christ sli.-ill rise llrsU 
Then we who are alive and iii«viain chall be caught up together with them in tli4 
'dowels, to meet the Lord i/n tlieair^ anjd so suaul wje ever he witjx xiiJi lojiux*" 



300 

Tliis IS referred to in 2nd Thess. ii. 1, as "the coming of our Lord Jesus 
(liriit, and onr fjathering together v7ito him:' The first event that takes 
plare, then, after the return of the Lord from heaven, is the "gathering 
togetlicr " of all His saints to him, including the dead of past ages, who shall 
have been raised for the purpose. This gathering together is to judgment ; 
for Paul says, "We (Christians) must aU appear before the judgment seal of 
Christ, that every man may receive the things in body, according to that he 
hath done, whether it be good or bad " (2 Cor. v. 10) ; and the parables which 
Christ spake on earth, illustrative of his then approaching departure to heaven, 
and his subsequent return, have this characteristic: " And it came to pass that 
when he was returned, having received the kingdom, then he commandrd those 
TO BE CALLED UNTO HIM, to whom he had given the money." From all which 
it appears that on his return, his dead servants will be raised, and his living 
servants gathered with them from every part of the earth where they may be 
scattered, to be arraig-ned before him, that he may "take account of them." 
—(Matt, xviii. 23.) He will approve of some, and reject others; the latter will 
be sentenced to share in the judgments which will descend upon the 
apocal}i)tic "beast and his armies," * or sin, as politicaUy and ecclesiastically 
embodied in the powers that will "make Avar with the Lamb and his army;" 
the former mil be admitted to the marriage ceremony, in which they will be 
confessed "before the Father and aU the holy angels" (Matt. x. 32), and wiU 
thenceforward "follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth" (Eev. xiv. 4), and 
therefore co-operate with him in the infiiction upon the nations of that 
"judgment written" which vras treated of in the earlier part of the lecture. 
All this takes place before divine judgments commence, but not before that 
" distress of nations with perplexity," which is the preliminary symptom of 
the ai^proaching " time of trouble, such as never was." That state of political 
embarrassment, social trouble, and heart -failing, wiU, probably, prevail for a 
considerable time before the saints are called away to the reckoning, and men 
v,'ill only consider it a repetition of commotions that have many times recurred 
in the course of history. They only look to its proximate cause. They will 
never suspect that a divine hand is guiding the development of events, or that 
" the judge is nigh, even at the door." They will never dreani' that the world 
is on the verge of the most aAvful crisis that has ever occurred in its history, — 
that divine indignation, long restrained, is about to \isit the world in 
destroying judgments that T\'iil break up the entire system of human society, 
as politically, ecclesiastically, and socially organised, and decimate large 
masses of its corrupt and godless population. But like the little hand-cloud 



* AVlrlch Jcsuii styles " the devil and his angels."— Matt. xvi. 4. 



301 

presaging the coming storm, the saints will be removed at a particular 
juncture of affairs without previous intimation. In aU probabiHty, however, 
this event will be so inconspicuous as to attract Httle attention. AU that the 
world wiU know of it wiU be, that a few obscure individuals, holding 
^'fanatical" doctrines, have mysteriously disappeared; but of course few wiU 
ever seriously suppose that there is anything supernatural in the occurrence. 
Theories of the phenomenon wiU be ready to hand, and the incident will be 
forgotten— at least by the majority. Some who happened to know that this 
expected removal was part of the doctrine of these fanatical people, may be 
unable to queU a certain feeling of uneasiness which will trouble their breasts; 
but the world at large will be unaffected, and wiU move on to the destruction 
that awaits it at the revelation of Jesus with all his saints. 

For the sake of clearness, it will be weU to summarize the events already 
spoken of, in their chronological order. 

1st.— "On earth distress of nations with perplexity," arising from the 
compHcation of international politics, described as " evil going forth from 
nation to nation," and producing a failing of heart among men.— (Luke xxi. 
25: Jeremiah XXV. 32.) 

2nd.~The coming of Christ as a thief (Eev. xvi. 15,) after the development 
of certain events to be spoken of hereafter. 
3rd.— Resurrection of " the dead in Christ." 

4th.— The gathering of the saints to Christ from all parts of the earth, 
including the living and those.who have been dead. 

5'th.— The judgment of His servants, comprising the rejection of the 
unworthy ; and acceptance of the " good and faithful ; " the sending away of 
the former into the territory of the nations on whom judgment will descend, 
and the uniting of the latter as "the bride made ready," in glorious marriage, 
to the long absent but then arrived bridegroom. 

6th.— War between the "powers that be," and the Lamb, who shalLovercomo 
them. 

7th.— Heavy judgments infficted on the nations by Jesus and the saints, 
producing great slaughter over all the earth, and resulting in the complete 
abolition of the existing order of things, and in the teaching of men 
righteousness. 

8th.— Setting up of the Kingdom of God, which will last for a thousand 
years, and then undergo a change in its constitution, adapting it to the 
necessities of the eternal ages beyond. 

This is a general outline of the events which will occur at " the end," in 
' connection with the establishment of the Kingdom of God. It is deficient, 
i however, in one important respect; it docs not embrace those events 



302 

which constitute the occasion of the Messiah's thief-like acLrent, and 
takes no note of the political sii^s which are revealed in Scripture as the 
premonitory indications of the near approach of the end. These, with the 
question of how near the world probably lies to the great crisis, will be 
dealt with in the next lecture. 



LECTURE XI. ( A . ) 



TIMi:S AND SIGNS; OR TEE EVIDENCE TEAT TEE END IS NEAH. 

Theee are many signs abroad indicative of the near approach of that 
interference of God in the affairs of men, which will result in changing the 
kingdoms of this world into "the kingdoms of our Lord and His Christ." 
(Rev. xi. 15.) To discern these, however, it requires a large amount of 
knowledge in reference to what God has done, and what He has declared He 
will do. History and prophecy must be known and understood. These are the 
two great lights ^'hich reveal the bearing of current events. "Without them, a 
man will neither recognise or be interested in "the signs of the times." 

Our first enquiry must be in reference to " times and seasons." Tliis is the 
key to the whole subject, for if we have no clue to our wherabouts in the 
Gentile era, and no knowledge of the length to which that era will run, it is 
obvious we have no reason for believing ourselves in the neighboui'hood of the 
end, and nothing to justify us in seeking to find in contemporaneous events the 
signs that attend and usher in that end. On one point there can be no difference 
of opinion, and that is, that whether understood or not, there are in the 
Scriptures distinct specifications of time in relation to the events of the future. 
The best proof of this is to be found in the following' quotations : 

"Thou slialt arise and have mercy upon Zion, for the time to favour her, yea THE 
SET TIME is come." — Psalm cii. 13. 

" The vision is yet for an appointed TirtiE, but at the end it shall speak and not 
lie." — Hab. ii. 3. 

" At the time appointed, the end shall he." — Dan. viii. 19. 

"He (the little horn) shall speak great words against the Most High, and shall 
weai out the saints of the Most High, and think to change times and laws, and they 
shall he given into His hand until a time and times, and tJie dividing of time."— Dan. 
Til. 25. 



303 

"How long shall be the vision? . . . And He sr.id unto me, ZJnio 

two thousand and three hundred days ; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed.''— Dan. 
viii. 13, 14. 

" From the time that the daily sacrifice shall be taken away, and the abomination 
that maketh desolate set up, there shall be a thousand two hundred and ninety days,'* 
— Dan. xii. 11. 

"The holy city shall they tread under iooi forty and two months.'' — Rev. xi. 2. 

"To the woman were given two wings of a great eagle, that she might fly into the 
wilderness, into her place where she is nourished, /or a time and time and half a time, 
from the face of the serpent."— Rev. xii 14. 

These passages prove two things ; first, that " a set time " exists in the mind 
of the Deity for the consummation of His purpose — a conclusion which must 
commend itself to every mind realizing the fact that God knows all things 
from the end to the beginning ; and second, that He has given a revelation of 
''times and seasons." This revelation may be at first sight obscure, but the 
fact of its having been given cannot be (denied in view of the before-cited 
quotations. This being so, there arises the presumption that they are capable 
of being understood, since as a matter of revelation, they could be given for no 
other purpose. "We have, however, to notice the qualification with which this 
conclusion is divinely associated. "We refer to the words addressed to Daniel : 
" None of the wicked shall understand, but the wise shall understand." — (Dan. 
xii. 10.) This would imply that the matter is not communicated in such a 
form as to be apprehended on the surface of it, but requires the application of 
*' wisdom ' ' to elucidate the hidden meaning. 

We would also quote words" of similar purport occurring in the Apocalypse : 
''^'KerQiii^msdom; let him that h.'Sith.vndcj'sta 'riding^ count the number of the 
beast ; " shewing that the matter as presented was an enigma requiring to be 
unlocked by the keys of knowledge. In view of this, we need not be surprised 
at the mistakes that have from time to time been made in the interpretation of 
the tim.es and seasons. Wisdom is more precious than rubies and a great deal 
more scarce. Long experience alone engenders it, and a part of that experience 
is undoubtedly the blunders made by others, for as the proverb has it, ''A 
fool's "mistake is the wise man's lesson." Numberless and outrageously absurd 
theories have, in all ages of the world, been put forward on the strength of 
what is written on times and seasons. Dates have been fixed, and events 
predicted which time has falsified. This fact has staggered weak minds, and 
induced contempt and scepticism in reference to the whole subject. Even many 
of the devout have become disgusted, and refuse to give credence to an}- thing 
advanced on the subject ; but this must surely be admitted to be evidence of 
shortsightedness rather than of wisdom. There is a great diftercnco between 
incompetent interpretation and essential absurdity in the nature of the matter 



804 

interpreted. No devout mind, receiving the word of God in all sincerity, as 
the manifestation of His mind for the enlightenment of His servants, vrill be 
content to accept the fooleries of the past as a disproof of the intelligibility of 
what God has made known, but under the conviction that underneath the 
misunderstood enigmas of His word, there lie important facts which He would 
have us understand, will anxiouslj^ endeavour to penetrate the obscurity which 
has baffled others, and get at the mind of God in a matter so important in its 
bearings on our mental relation to the purposes of God. 

Some people imagine that the New Testament bars the way against all 
enquiry on the subject of times and seasons ; but on examination, this will 
appear to be a mistake. It is true that Jesus said to his disciples, '* It is not 
for you to know the times and the seasons which the Father hath put in His 
own power " (Acts i. 7) ; but this had a special bearing to the time and the 
persons in reference to whom the words were uttered, in no way conflicting 
with the present enquiry. They were spoken to the disciples on the eve of his 
ascension at a time when they needed such words. Tlieir minds were filled 
with solicitude for the manifestation of the kingdom. They had asked " Lord, 
wilt thou at this time restore againj the kingdom to Israel ?" They did not 
know that the time for the kingdom was yet afar off. They were apparently 
ignorant that a great interval had to elapse, even " the times of the Gentiles." 
They did not know that the hard work of preaching the Gospel had to be 
done ; and the harder work of developing a people for God by the faith 
preached, involving much suffering for his name, much long and weary waiting 
through a long night of centuries, for his coming. The idea that the kingdom 
was then to bo established, was an obstacle in the way of the work on which 
they were about to be called to enter, and therefore Jesus dispels it bytellingthem 
it was not for them in their circumstances, to be thinking of times and seasons, 
but to return to Jerusalem, and there await the effusion of the Spirit which was to 
qualify them to give a testimony for him as his -fitnesses throughout all Judea 
and Samaria, and the uttermost parts of the earth. This was reasonable and 
appropriate in the circumstances ; but to construe what was said appropriately 
to the time and the circumstances, into a discountenance and prohibition of all 
.subsequent research on the subject, would evince a short-sighted judgment, 
and introduce an element of discord into the Word, which would thus be made 
to discourage in one place the study of that which it revealed in another. 

Reliance is also placed in 1 Thess. v. 1, by those who disparage the study of 
pn.phetic times. Paul wrote to the Thessalonians (1 Thess. v. 1) : — 

" Of the times and the seasons, brethren, ye have no need that I write unto yon, 
lor yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the 
night. For when they shall say, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction cometh 



805 

npon them, as travail upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape. But jie, 
brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. Ye are all 
the children of the light, and the children of the day. We are not of the night; nor 
of drarkness." 

Eut so far from answering the intended purpose, these words of Paul show 
thai the subject of "the times and seasons" was not a proscribed one. Paul 
intimates that he would have written on the subject to them, but he says " Ye 
HAVS NO NEED that I do SO, and the reason i^, yourselves know that when the day 
eomes, it will come as a thief -unexpected and undesired — upon the world, but 
not upon you, for ye are all the children of the light and of the day." The 
sense in which they were the children of light may be understood in two ways. 
It may mean "You, Thessalonians, are i^eady for the day of the Lord; therefore, 
it does not matter when the day comes ; it is needless to speak of times and 
seasons when you are prepared for the event." This is evidently the view the 
Tliessalonians took of it ; for Paul's second letter to them found them expecting 
the immediate manifestation of Christ. But that this was the vv'rong 
construction of his words, appears in what he says in his second letter to the 
same church. He says, " We beseech you, brethren . . . that ye be 
not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by 
letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive 
you by any means, foe that day shall not come, except theee come a 
FALLING AWAY FiEST," &c. From this it is evident that the second way of 
construing Paul's words, in the 1st Epistle, is the correct one, viz., " It is not 
necessary for me to write about times and seasons, for ye are the children of 
the hght, and ought to know about them." Why should Paul assume they know 
all about it ? He gives us his reason in the 2nd Epistle: "Pemembcr ye not 
thsit while I was yet with yov, I told you these things." (verse 5.) If they 
were ignorant, it was because they had forgotten what Paul told them ; for Paul 
had told them that Christ could not be manifested until certain events foretold 
in the prophets, had transpired. At the same time, it cannot be denied, that 
their ideas of the times and seasons would, necessarily, be more imperfect and 
confused than ours ; first, because of the great distance of time which divided 
them from the end ; and second, because of the then impending visitation of 
divine judgment upon Jerusalem and the Jewish nation, foretold by Jesiis, 
which had the effect of concentrating their interest to some extent uj^on tlieir 
own generation, and in many cases, of creating the expectation that as God 
was about to come on the scene in judgment, Ho would not leave it without 
effecting their deliverence, the more especially as Jesus nssccialod tluMattir 
with the former, as regarded the succession of events, tliough as time has 
shewn, not as regarded chronological sequence. 



306 

A statement in Daniel (xii. 4,) seems to indicate that it is in our own times 
more particularly that the prophetic visions are to be understood, both as 
regards their events and times: *'But thou, O Daniel, shut up the words 
and seal the book to the time of the e7id ; many shall run to and fro, and 
knoivledge shall be i/ie7'eas(d." There is a reason why the words may be 
understood at the time of the end. In "the words" are prophetically 
delineated historical events extending over centuries, and at the time of the 
end, we have the facts of accomplished history as the infallible interpreters of 
these words. By the aid of those facts, we are enabled to comprehend the 
prophetic scheme, both as regards its events and times, and so to gauge our 
position as to determine where we stand in relation to the wonderful consumma- 
tion of the end itself. 

Coming now to the question of "How long?" it will be observed that in the 
passag-es quoted, the times defined are measured for the most part by "days." 
The first question to be considered, therefore, is, what are we to understand by 
the word so used ? Are we to read it as the representative of so many days of 
24 hours' duration? A class has arisen and multiplied considerably, who say 
"Yes," with all confidence. But we ask them, if that is so, how it is that 
Daniel did not understand? "He heard, hut understood noC' (Dan. xii. 8), 
when informed of the duration of the vision in days. And how is it that the 
wise alone are to understand? If it mean literal days, there is no wisdom 
required. To read it as literal days is a simple method of interpretation, 
which may be accepted with relief by minds incapable from disuse of going 
below the surface of things, and of rising to heights of knowledge through 
stepping-stone indications on the level; but the fallacy of the principle 
becomes apparent on the merest attempt to interpret the statements in 
question in accordance with it. For instance, Daniel saw a vision (chap, viii.) 
in which the following events are comprehended: the beginning and rise of 
the Persian empire, its overthrow by Alexander the Great, the partition of the 
Grecian empire, at that monarch's death, into four parts, and the appearance 
of the Boman power in the southern section of the divided empire, resulting in 
the death of Jesus, the disruption of the Jewish commonwealth, and the final 
casting down of the destroying enemy. The vision having passed before 
Daniel, he hears the question asked, "How loxg shall he the vision?'^ in 
answer to which, the statement was made, " Unto two thousand and three 
hundred days; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed (or avenged)." Now. if 
we interpret this to mean that the events represented in the vision should only 
occupy 2,300 natural days, we turn the xdsion into absurdity. We make it 
compress into little more than six years, events, the first of which, viz., the 
rise and development of the Persian empire, alone took nearly 250 years I The 



807 

literal-day theorists attempt to get out of the difficulty by applying the period 
mentioned in the vision to the ravages of Antiochus Epiphanes, who suppressed 
the daily sacrifice for something like seven years, at the end of which it was 
restored by the Maccabees; but this suggestion is entirely set aside by the 
statement of the angel, (verst 17,) that "at the time of the end shad he the 
vision^ Even if we had not this distinct intimation, the suggestion would be 
negatived by the improbability of such a minor event being made the subject 
of prophecy for the wise of all time; but it is eifectually precluded by the 
scope of the events represented in the vision to which the statement of time 
applies, and by the further declaration of the angel that the vision should be 
^'■for many days'' — (verse 26.) 

In the 11th chap, we have a prox^hetic message angelically communicated to 
Daniel, "in the third year of Cyrus, king of Persia." This message 
commences with the date given, and, bridging all subsequent history, goes 
down to the destruction of "the king of the north," on the mountains of 
Israel, at the manifestation of Jesus when the resurrection takes place. As in 
the other case, Daniel hears the question asked " How long shall it be to ike 
end of these wonders ^^ '' The answer is, ''^ For a time, times, a7id a half 
Daniel says "I heard but understood not." A time was a Jewish period 
made up of 360 days. " Time, times, and a half" were, therefore, equivalent to 
" one time, two times, and half a time, " "or three times and a half ; " or 1 260 days. 
It was, therefore, no wonder that Daniel failed to understand, because the events 
h£ had witnessed in vision were on such a scale as required centuries for develop- 
ment. The measure of such events by days might well bafiie his understanding. 
Tliis mode of measurement is repeated in answer to Daniel's beseeching 
question, " 0, my Lord, what shall be the end of these things ? " — (Dan. xii. 8.) 
"From the time that the daily sacrifice shall be taken away, and tlie 
abomination that maketh desolate set up, there shall he a thoumnd two hundred 
and ninety days. Blessed is he that waiteth and cometh to the thousand three 
hundred and thirty-five days (45 days more). But go thy way till the end be, 
for thou shalt rest, and stand in thy lot at the end of the days'' It is evident 
that literal days are not meant in these expressions. Centuries have elapsed 
since the events to which they apply commenced to transjure ; and the period 
defined, taken literally, has multiplied itself hundreds of times, and yet there 
is no arrival of the end foretold. 

The question then is, what is meant by these prophetic days ? We affirni 
on the strength of the following evidence, that oacli day represents a 
year. 

Moses sent spies to search the land of Canaan, in the second year aftcn- tho 
children of Israel came out of Egypt. The spies were away forty days, and 



308 

returned, at the end of that time Tvith a discouraging report as to the prolDa- 
bilities of a successful invasion of the country, and advised a rejection of 
Moses, and a return of the whole congregation into Eg;v^pt. The people, ever 
prone to distrust God, hearkened to the counsel of the spies, and were about to 
put it into execution, when God interfered, and vindicating Moses, gave 
sentence against the whole generation, in the following words : 

" Your carcases shall fall in this wilderness, and all that were numbered of yon, 
according to your whole number, from twenty years old and upwards, which have 
murmured a trainst me, doubtless ye shall not come into the land 
and your children shall wander in the wilderness forty years, and bear your 
whoredoms, until your carcases be wasted in the wilderness. After the number of 
the days in icliich ye searched the land, even forty days, each day for a year, shall 
ye bear your iniquity, even forty years." — Numbers xiv. 29, 30, 33, 34. 

This is an historical transaction, in which a literal day was made the basis 
of a literal year. "We now cite a case of prophecy : 

Ezekiel was commanded to make a miniature representation of Jerusalem, 
and conduct a mimic siege against it, for the purpose of signifjdng to the 
people of Jerusalem that God intended to punish them for their iniquity. He 
was then instructed to signify the times in relation to the events represented- 

" Lie thou also upon thy left side, and lay the iniquity of the house of Israel upon 
it : according to the number of days that thou shalt lie upon it, thou shalt bear their 
iniquity ; for I have laid upon thee the years of their iniquity according- to the 
NUMBER OF THE DAYS, 390 days ; so shalt thou bear the iniquity of the house of 
Israel. And when thou hast accomplished them, lie again on thy right side, and thou 
«halt bear the iniquity of the house of Judah forty days : I have appointed thee each 
DAY FOR A YEAR." — Ezekiel iv. 4. 

Here was a symbolical transaction, in which " times and seasons" were to 
be represented ; and it is expressly directed that the symbolization of time 
should be on the scale of a day for a year. 

That this is the scale on which the prophetic periods of Daniel are fixed, is 
evident from a well-known case in which his prediction of time has been 
historically verified. " Seventy weeks " are employed to define the period 
that was to elapse from the issue of the fijial Persian edict for the restoration 
and rebuilding of Jerusalem, to the accomplishment of the following objects 
in the death of the Messiah : 1st, to finish the transgression ; 2nd, to make an 
end of sin ; 3rd, to make reconciliation for iniquity ; 4th, to bring in everlast- 
ing righteousness ; oth, to seal up the vision and the prophecy ; and 6th, to 
anoint the Most Holy. Seventy weeks are 490 days: hence, "seventy weeks" 
is but another way of expressing 490 days. In view of this, h£)w significant 
is the fact that from the edict in question (Artaxerxes, B.C. 4:56), to the cruci- 
fixion of Christ, there elapsed a period of exactly 490 years, A dispute 
among chronologists, as to whether the period reached exactly to the 490th 



809 

year, does not detract from the weight of the evidence furnished in the fulfil- 
ment of this prophecy of the truth of the day-for-a-year principle, as applied 
to the solution of the prophetic periods ; the fact that there is a dispute, only 
illustrates the obscurity of ancient history where precise dates are involved. 

Adopting the year-day principle, we shall proceed to point out the evidences 
which show that we have now reached nearly the utmost limit of the 
times of the Gentiles, and stand upon the verge of the future foretold by tho 
prophets. There are four ®r five distinct methods of demonstrating thiis 
conclusion ; four or five independent modes of computation, which lead to an 
identical result ; four or five separate chronological lines which converge on a 
single epoch in the world's history, uniting to tell us the grand and awful 
tidings that the moment is nearly on us when the Most High, inhabiting 
eternity, having long holden His peace, is, in the person of Jesus, about to 
stir himself up like a mighty man of war, and to enter into con- 
troversy with the nations of the earth, breaking their ungodly 
power, bringing down their strength to the earth, teaching them 
righteousness by angry judgments, and subduing them to the sceptre of the 
kingdom of David, under the yoke of which they will taste the blessing that 
all the generations of Adam, for a weary 6,000 years, have yeam-ed and sighed 
after, but which they cannot have and never will realize until ''that man 
whom God hath appointed" is manifested in the earth as "a hiding-place 
from the wind and a covert from the tempest, as rivers of water in a dry 
place, as the shadow of a great rock in a weary land." — (Isaiah xxxii. 1.) 

The first is not in itself a conclusive mode of reckoning ; but its coincidence 
with those that are certain, shows there is truth in it. We refer to the tradition 
which is of very ancient origin, that as God effected the re- organization of the 
world physical in six natural days, and consecrated the seventh as a day of 
rest and blessing, so will He occupy six days, of a thousand years each, in 
setting in order the political heavens and earth of human affairs, and set apart 
the seventh millennium, or period of a thousand years, as a Sabbatical era, in 
which righteousness and peace will prevail, as the waters cover the sea. This 
theory is not expressly affirmed in the Word, but it is not altogether Avithout 
countenance. The duration of the kingdom, for instance, happens to be tlio 
exact length of the supposed Sabbatical era ; and this period — (the kingdom 
prepared of God for them that love Him) — is expressly spoken of by Paul as a 
Sabbatical rest, and therefore in some sense a seventh period. — (Heb. iv. 9.) 
Peter's expression " One day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a 
thousand years as one day" (2 Peter iii. 8) — is quoted by some writers in 
favour of the k-adition in question, but much stress cannot be hiid on it. Tlio 
theory rests on other grounds ; and the strongest of these is its chrunuh-gical 



310 

agreement with the minor prophetic periods. Assuming it to be a correct 
method of reckoning, how far are we on this principle from the end of the 
human era ? The answer to this question depends upon the age of the world 
(not geologically, but since the Adamic creation). The process by which this 
point is ascertained, is necessarily a long and laborious one. We must refer to 
the results achieved by those who have gone through the process, and who 
have demonstrated every link in the chronological chain. We rely particu- 
larly on the deductions of Dr. Thomas, who has given a great deal of attention 
to the subject, and who has placed the results of his research in such a form 
before the general reader, that the process which has cost him much time and 
labour can in a moment be verified or impug-ned. The general result is to 
show that the world was 4,090 years old at the birth of Christ, instead of 4,00 -i, 
as commonly supposed. Add to 4,090 the present A.D. 18C6, and we get 5,956 
as the real age of the world at the present time. If this be so, there wants 
about 44 years to complete the 6,000 years of the great world- week, and there- 
fore we are that number of years from the time when the blessing of Abrahatta 
shall prevail o'er the whole world through Christ. But we are not, therefore, 
that number of years from the advent. This may happen within the next 
twelve months. The coming of Christ is one event ; the setting up of the 
kingdom another. The foimer event must necessarily precede the latter by a 
considerable period. The constitution of human society cannot be broken up 
in judgment and reorganised in righteousness in a day. This is a work that 
will take time. As a matter of speculation, it would have been difficult to 
arriA'e at an estimate of the interval necessaiy for this work, but the point is set 
at rest by a testimony in Micah, in which it is said of the latter-day judgment 
of the nations by means of Israel: '^ AccoEri^^rG to the days of thy coxtn^g 
OUT of the land of Egypt will I show m-arvellous things ; and the nations 
shall see and be confounded at all their might, and shall creep out of their 
holes like serpents," &c. This gives at least forty years of di^-ine operation in 
the earth before the final inauguration of the Sabbatical millennium, and, there- 
fore, admits of Christ coming 40 years before the end of the 6,000 years. 

The next period dema^iding attention is the one known as '' The Seven 
Times of Daniel," which arise in connection with a brief and familiar history 
recorded in Dan. iv. Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, saw in a dream a stately 
tree alfording shelter to the beasts of the field and the fowls of heaven ; and 
while he beheld, an angel descended, and gave orders that the tree should be 
hewn down, but that the stump should be left in the earth and banded with 
iron and brass, and that seven times should pass over it. Daniel interpreted 
this to mean that Nebuchadnezzar should be diiven from his kingdom, and 
should herd with the beasts of the field, for a Literal period of seven times, or 



" 311 

n-earlj seven jears, in accordance with winch, it came so to pass, and at the end 
of the period, Nebuchadnezzar's understanding returned, and he blessed the 
Most High. On a superficial view of the case, it would appear as if there was 
nothing but the Hteral in this narrative, and as if the import of the vision ter- 
minated with the restoration of Nebuchadnezzar, at the end of seven Uteral 
times ; but a deeper insight will reveal a splendid political allegory on the f a^e 
of the Kteral narrative. In poHtical symboHsm, a tree represents a kingdom 
(see Ezek. xxxi. and Matt. xiii. 32). The tree of Nebuchadnezzar's dream 
would, therefore, represent Nebuchadnezzar's kingdom, though standing 
primarily for himself. On this principle, we can understand the banding of 
the tree stump with iron and brass ; because when the Babylonian dominion 
was shorn away, the kingdoms that succeeded it were but a poHtical bandaging 
of the power of Babylon with the brazen and iron, or Greek and Eoman elements. 
Furthermore, in standing for Nebuchadnezzar personally, the tree necessarily 
stood for the kingdom of Babylon, for Nebuchadnezzar was himself but the 
representative of the kingdom. This is apparent from the second chapter. 
Nebuchadnezzar is there addressed by Daniel (verse 38) as the dynastic 
representative of the golden dominion. " Tnou art tliis head of gold ; and, 
after thee, shall arise anothee kingdom," as if Nebuchadnezzar were a kino-- 
dom. So he was representatively, in the second chapter, and so we may 
presume he was in the fourth chapter, and went through the transactions 
therein narrated, as the dramatic personator of the fortunes of his kingdom. 
At any rate, the narrative bears an extraordinary allegorical correspondence 
to the historical sequel. The seven times allegorically computed would 
commence with Nebuchadnezzar's ascension to the throne of Babylon. 
This was in 610 B.C. Now, by adding seven times of years (360 X 7=2,520 
years) to that date, we come to the exact ending of the 6,000 years of the 
world's age. Thus : — 

Seven Times— commencing Nebuchadnezzar's reign, B.C. 610 2,520 
To find the conclusion of this period, A.D., deduct the years 

that elapsed before Christ . . . , .610 

Giving as the expiry of the seven times A.D. . . 1,910 

World 6,000 years old * . , A.D. . . 1,910 

This result is remarkable, and confirms the supposition arising on a close 
consideration of Dan. iv., viz., that the seven times that literally measured 
Nebuchadnezzar's banishment from the empire, are also intended symbolically 
measure the era of the world's alienation from God, from the time of the 
ision. At tho end of the seven literal times, Nebuchadnezzar says " Mine 



understanding returned unto me, and I blessed the Most High, and praised an( 
honoured Him that liveth for ever and ever." How strikingly this represen" 
the change that A\dll come over the kingdoms of the world at the close of th( 
symbolic seven times, when 

*' The Gentiles shall come imto thee from the ends of the earth, and shall say, 
Surely, our fathers have inherited lies, vanity, and things wherein there is no 
profit." — Jer. xvi. 19. 

" All nations T\-hom Thou hast made shall come and worship before Thee, Lord, 
and shall glorify Thy name." — Psalm Ixxxvi. 9. 

*' Neither shall they walk any more after the imagination of their evil heart."-* 
Jer. iii. 17. 

" Many people shall go and say Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of tho 
Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, and He will teach us of His ways, and vro 
will walk in His paths." — Isaiah ii. 3. 

" When the people are gathered together, and the kingdoms to serve the Lord."— 
Psalm cii. 22. 

" From the rising of the sun even to the going down of the same, my name shall 
be great among the Gentiles." — Mai. i. 11. 

*' So shall they fear the name of the Lord from the west, and His glory from th# 
rising of the sun." — Isaiah lix. 19. 

The next period claiming attention is one mentioned in connection with a 
vision recorded in Dan. viii. The vision was communicated in symbol, and the 
features of it were these :— A ram with two unequal horns was seen prevailing 
in a western, northern, and southern direction, when having " become great," 
its career was interrupted by the advent of a he-goat from the west, with a 
great horn between its eyes. A collision between the two symboHc animals 
resulted in the utter discomfiture and down-trampling of the ram, and the 
aggrandizement of the goat. The goat's notable horn, however, was broken 
immediately afterwards, and, in its place, there sprang four horns, out of 
which came a fifth horn, which prospered to the destroying of aU things 
Jewish. The interpretation is suppHed along with the vision itself, so that 
the symbols became highly interesting. The ram with two horns is stated 
(verse 20) to be the joint dynasty of Media and Persia ; and the goat, the 
kingdom of Greece, under the leadership of its "first (imperial) king" op 
Alexander the Great. This being so, the fight between the a^als 
represents the war between the two powers, which resulted in the subjugation 
of the Persian empire, and the establishment of Grecian rule over the 
civiHsed habitable. The breaking of the notable horn is the death of 
Alexander, just as he completed his miHtary triumphs; and the up-growth 
Ol four horns, the division of Alexander's empire among his four generals, 



] 



813 

Antiochus, Seleucus, Cassander, and Lysimachus. Out of one of these was 
to appear a power which should ^' destroy the mighty and the holy people " 
or the Jews. This identifies it as the Roman power, which, in relation to the 
oewish state, made its first appearance in the territory aUotted to Seleuctis 
and afterwards completely uprooted the Jewish power in a series of campaio^s 
culmmating in the destruction of Jerusalem, and the nearly total extermination 
of the race of Jews, The vision closes with this triumph, and leaves the 
future m darkness, with the exception of a general intimation that the power 
thus destroying the mighty and the holy people should be « broken without 
hand." In the vision itself, there was nothing to represent to Daniel the 
length of time during which this little-horn power of the goat (described as 
of fierce countenance) should prevail over the kingdom of Jehovah. In a 
word, the length of "the times of the Gentiles" was not indicated in the 
symbols. This defect, however, was supplied before the vision finaUy closed. 

*' Then I heard one saint speaking, and another saint said unto that certain saint 
which spake, How long shall be the vision concerning the daily sacrifice and the 
transgression of desolation, to give both the sanctuary and the host to be trodden 
under foot ? And he said unto me, Unto two thousand and three hundred 
DAYS ; then shall the sanctuary be cleansed." * 

Now it happens that there are three different original readings of the 
number of days mentioned in this reply. One set of manuscripts has " 2,200 
days;" another "2,300days;" andathird, -2,400days." We have, therefore, 
to choose between the three. Five hundred years ago, it would have been 
difficult to make an election, except in so far as other (conterminous) dates, 
with which this must have been made to agree, might have assisted us in 
the choice. Now, however, we are enabled inf aUibly to decide, for the simple 
reason that the first two readings are negatived by historic failure in the date. 
"2,200 days" snded 200 years ago, and no avenging of the sanctuary took 
place; '^2,300" expired 100 years ago, with a like want of result. But it 
may be said. How do you know that "2,200" ended two centuries ago, 
and "2,300" a hundred years since? The answer is very yimplo. Find 
the commencement of any term of years, and the termination follows 
of itself. Now the commencement of the period in qucstit)n, is identical 
with the commencement of the vision itself. The question is '' Ilotu 
lon</ shall be the vision," &c., that is, over what time will the vision just 
witnessed extend ? This being so, we have only to ascertain the dato of tho 
first event seen in the vision, and from that date reckon the curronoy of the 
period defined as the duration of the events represented. By uousulting tho 
vision, the reader will perceive that tho first event is tho a2)puarance of tlio 
'Medo-Persian empii^e, in that particular aspect of it signified by tho greater 



314 

altitude of one horn of the ram over the other. The two horns are expressly 
declared to be representative of the two elements of the ram kingdom — the 
Median and the Persian. This being so, it follows that the increase of the 
second horn over the first in size (for it is said "the higher came up last : ") 
represents the more prolonged ascendancy of the Persian element, which waaj 
the last to come to the throne. Darius, the Mede, reigned two years, and] 
dying without issue, he was succeeded by his nephew, Cyrus, the Persian, 
whose family retained power till the empire was overthrown by Greece, 200 
years later. When Daniel saw the ram, it would appear at first that both 
horns were on its head, from which it might be argued that the date of the 
vision's commencement would be indefinitely somewhere at the beginning of 
the Persian monarchy ; but the supplementary statement that " the higher 
came up last " would suggest that Daniel was a witness of the first shooting 
out of the second or overtopping horn. If this is a correct induction, " the 
times of the vision'* would commence with the ascension of Cyrus to the 
throne : he being the inception of the higher horn that came up last. This 
would give 540 B.C. as the beginning of the days. Cei'tainly the days did 
not begin earlier. They may have begun later. If the statement " the higher 
came up lastf is an explanation, and not a description of what Daniel actually 
saw, the date of commencement would have to be sought for at the time when 
Cyrus had reigned long enough to constitute the Persian horn, as a matter of 
fact, the higher of the two. Adopting 540 B.C. as the date of commencement, 
the erroneousness of the 2,200 and 2,300 readings is at once apparent; for the 
one would give A.D. 1660, and the other A.D. 1760, as the termination of the 
vision, and the time for the avenging of the sanctuary. Adopting 2,400, for 
which scholars tell us there is as much authority as either of the other two, 
we get 1860 as the date of the expiry. Some may think that this must be 
equally a mistake with the other, as no steps, such as are contemplated in the 
predicted " avengement," have yet been taken. To this, it can only be 
remarked that supposing this to be the case, it does not show the " 2,400 
days " to be wrong, but only that they have been commenced too early, in fixing 
upon the first year of Cyrus's sole reign as the commencement, which would 
favour the suggestion already thrown out, that the commencement ought to 
be dated later on in Persian annals, when the second horn had, as a matter of 
history, waxed greater than the Median horn, with which the empire com- 
menced. But it is not certain that nothing marks the epoch commencing 
1860, as affecting the land and interests of " the holy people." On the 
contrary, it is a fact of the greatest notoriety, that this is a period of great 
activity in connection with Palestine and the Jews. We cannot better illus- 
trate this fact, than by quoting the following extract from a letter written 
from Jerusalem, in January of 1865 :— 



SI5 

"The habitual oriental monotony which made life in the city of the great King so 
wearisome, has of late given way to extraordinary activity and a lively business. The 
widening of the narrow lanes— streets they can hardly be called— the clearing of dust 
and rubbish of a thousand years and more, from the streets as well as from such 
houses as were used as receptacles of offal and filth, employ hundreds of men, who 
idled away their days, and lived by begging. Our Pasha (may he live long), 
superintends the work, and is very strict in carrying out the design of the "ruler of 
the faithful." English surveyors and French excavators, are alike busy to bring 
Jerusalem of old, which lies buried beneath the modern, to light again : and, indeed, 
they have already succeeded in discovering magnificent arches and walls, sewers 
and canals, also a subterranean well, which gives plenty of good water, an article so 
much needed for the comfort and health of the inhabitants of the city. Our 
brethren, the Jews— even those who actually gave up the hope of the coming of the 
Son of David, the Redeemer of Israel, do now believe that his advent is near at 
hand, as the Lord remem_bers Zion, and, as the dust thereof is favoured by the 
nations of the earth. If we are to believe the thousand rumours, we shall soon 
have roads for carriages around Jerusalem, a railway and telegraph to Jafi'a, &c., &c. 
The emigration of Jews, not only to Jerusalem, but also to other places in the 
Holy Land, is also without precedence. There are almost daily arrivals, and not 
only of that class who came to die here, and lived on the Chalukah— the distribution 
of alms collected in Europe and Africa — but also of such as bring some wealth with 
them, and who come to live in their fathers' land, to work, either in trade or 
agriculture ; and many mechanics. Let them come — there is plenty of room, and 
employment for every one who wants to do something." 

There are other evidences of revival in relation to Jewish affairs, which it 
"would occupy much space to notice. Whether 1860 or a later date be the true 
termination of the 2,400 period, there is no doubt about the epochal ending of 
the period falling in the lifetime of the present generation. This is the broad 
fact to which we desire special attention. The period must end on this side of 
the forty years already mentioned, for the simple reason that these forty years 
witness the process by which the result mentioned in the 2,400 vision is 
accomplished, viz., the cleansing or avengement of the sanctuary. This being 
so, we stand at the present moment somewhere about the end of the 
2,400 period; for in view of the age of the world, we cannot be more than 
four or five years from the commencement of the forty. 

The next period can be demonstrated with greater certainty and exactitude, 
and coincides with the result to which the 2,400 vision leads us, thereby 
affording powerful collateral evidence of the correctness of the millennary-wcolc 
theory, and the "seven times" method of computing the duration of the 
kingdom of men, and, at the same time establishing, with a strength that is 
almost irresistible, the gene>-al conclusion, that in 1866, we stand in oloso 
proximity to that wonder of historic wonders, the advent of Jesus in power 
and great glory, to destroy them that destroy the earth, and estabhsh " ii'lory 
to God in the highest, on earth, peace and goodwill toward men." 

We refer to tke four-beasts vision of Daniel. The four boasts, like the rour 
metals of the image, are explained to mean the four great imperiui (.I}'uai?tios, 



316 

under which mankind should successively be ruled with something like uni- 
versal dominion — (Dan. vii. 17, 23). Attention is specially directed to the fourth 
beast, as it is in connection with it more particularly, that the chronological 
considerations of the vision arise. This is universally admitted to be 
representative of the Koman empire, which, in relation to the Babylonish, was 
*'the fourth kingdom," (verse 23.) 

On the head of the fourth beast were ten horns. This number was augmen- 
ted by the appearance of an eleventh, which, however, by its aggressive acts, 
speedily diminished the whole number to eight. The eleventh horn was 
distinguished from its neigbours in having eyes and mouth, a " stout look," 
and a hostile propensity about it, which displaced three of the first horns to 
make way for itself. It employed its mouth in " speaking great things against 
the Most High ; ' ' and used its power against the Almighty, ultimately 
bringing about the perdition of the whole body corporate of which it formed 
a part. This, however, was not an instantaneous result ; the horn prevailed 
for a period before retribution came. The testimony is : — 

"He shall speak great words against the Most High, and shall wear out the saints 
of the Most High, and think to change times and laws, and they shall he given inia 
his hatid UNTIL A TIME AND TIMES, AND THE DIVIDING OF TIME." 

The conclusion of this period is marked by an event as follows : — 

" I beheld, then, because of the voice of the great words which the horn spake ; I 
beheld even till the beast was slain, and his body destroyed, and given to the burning 
flame." — (verse 11.) " The same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against 
them, until the Ancient of Days came, and judgment luas given to the saints of the Most 
High, and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom." — Averse 21, 22,; 
*' Jlie judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion to consume and to destroy 
it unto the end."— (verse 26.; 

Now the import of this symbolism is evident enough. The body of the 
beast being the Eoman empire, it follows, that the Roman empire was in some 
form to continue till the arrival of "the Ancient of Days" to destroy it, an 
event still in the future ; but as an undivided kingdom, it was not to continue : 
the ten horns on the head of the beast shew this. The interpretation is : " The 
ten horns out of this kingdom are te7i kings that shall arise.'' Kings 
represent dominions, and hence, the appearance of ten kings in the head of the 
beast shews that, ultimately, the Eoman empire of undivided magnitude, 
instead of continuing to be controlled by a single imperial will, as the body of 
a beast is by its head, w^s to be broken up into ten separate royalties or 
kingdoms, obeying so many separate political wills, and sustaining 
independent political existence, though forming part and parcel of the Roman 1 
system of nations. This fact is not less clearly apparent in Kebuchadnezzar's I 
vision of the image. The legs of ii^on represent the "autonomy" of the 



317 

empire in its prosperous days ; the feet, a mixture of iron and clay, and 
divided into ten toes, symbolize the later stage of Eoman history — a stage 
embracing the "modern " era up to the present time, and a little beyond — a 
stage in which the power and territory of the Eoman empire are distributed 
among rival states and monarchs who have sprung out of her political embers. 
The chronology of the fourth-beast symbol is determined by the career of the 
little horn. The fourth-beast system was to continue a time, times, and a half, 
from the time the little horn made its appearance^ at the end of which it was 
to be destroyed by divine judgment, and the dominion transferred to the saints. 
Hence, if we can identify the little horn in history, and fix the date of its 
appearance, we shall be enabled to arrive at a correct conclusion as to the time 
when the fourth-beast destroying judgment takes effect in the coming of the 
Ancient of Days, in the person of Jesus, to put an end to the arrogant 
blasphemies which prevail for time, times, and a half. To do thi:=i, we must 
give a little attention to the appearance of the ten horns, as the ten horns 
precede the advent of the little horn power. This takes us back to what is 
called "the fall of the Roman empire," when "the fourth kingdom" passed 
from its imperial to its divided and multiregal phase. Here we contemplate 
a protracted period of bloody revolution. The Roman arms, after 
centuries of resistless prowess, had lost their terror through the effeminacy 
of a race accustomed to victory and luxury, and the misgovemment of 
emperors, who ruled for private advantage instead of the public 
interest. The consequence was, that the rapacious hordes of Northern 
Europe and Asia, attracted to the tottering empire, like birds of prey 
to a rotting carcase, came down in torrents upon the fertile and cultivated 
countries of the south, and though held back for a time, tdtimately broke 
through every barrier, and defeating the Roman armies, capturmg the Roman 
fortresses, and ultimately sacking the proud empire-city herself, put an end to 
the mightiest dominion that ever ruled the civilized habitable. This, however, 
(which took more than a century to accomplish), though a destruction of what 
was considered the Roman empire, was but the introduction of the clay amongst 
the iron, not a displacing of the iron by the clay. The northern nations wero 
too lacking in genius, either social or political, to substitute a new order of 
society for that which they found among the civilized peoples of Rome. Tliey 
were a vigorous, but an uncivilized race, and substantially fell in with tho 
Roman order of things. True, there was an attempt by tho Vandals to 
abolish everything Roman, assimilate the conquered empire to llio 
institutions of its barbarian conquerors ; but this movement soon gave wny 
before a reaction, which demanded and hastened the rcstorati(.)n of Roiikui 
civiLizution. The clay intermingled itself with the ii'on, and was, ultimately, 



318 

moulded into shape by the stronger element. This is the time at which wo 
are to look for the ten horns ; for the ten horns in the beast vision represent the 
same asj^cct of the fourth kingdom, as the clay and iron ten-toed feet of the 
image vision. It is reasonable to assume that as soon as the Roman beast 
ceased to be controlled by its own head, it passed into the ten-horned state of 
government : that is, as soon as imperial Rome fell, as soon as the central 
government of the empire was destroyed, the empire passed into the 
dismembered state represented by the ten horns. If this be a reasonable 
assumption, we ought to find in her dismemberment a number of political 
divisions answering to the number of the horns. In considering this matter, 
we are met with the fact that the barbarian nations, on overturning the 
Roman empire, did not unite themselves under one government, and set up a 
new empire. They scattered themselves among the provinces of Roman 
Europe, and settled in such countries as were according to their liking, each 
nation setting up its own government independently of all the rest. In this 
way there sprang up a number of separate kingdoms in the territory formerly 
ruled by the undi\dded Roman sceptre ; that is, several distinct horns sprang 
out of the head of the beast. The question is, how many ? Daniel says ten, 
and history says ten. Sir Isaac Newton gives the following enumeration of 
the states that sprang up under the barbarian nations after the overthrow of 
Rome : 1 — Vandals and Alans (under one government, occupying Spain and 
Africa); 2 — Suevians (another part of Spain); 3 — Visigoths-, 4 — Alans 
(France) ; 5 — Burgundians ; 6 — Franks (separate from the Alans) ; 7 — Britons ; 
8 — Huns ; 9 — Lombards ; 10 — Ravenna. This enumeration is broadly taken, 
and confined to Roman territory. It takes no account of minor divisions, 
such as the dukedoms, (dignified by the name of kingdoms) into which 
Britain was divided, or the petty factions that were here and there to be 
found in connection with other states. It only takes note of the conspicuous 
and great divisions of political power, properly considered "kingdoms," that 
followed the downf al of Rome, in Roman territory. It takes no cognizance 
of Asiatic dominion, or of any political phenomenon beyond the limits of the 
fourth-beast territory ; and in this the discerning reader will say Sir Isaac 
Newton only adhered to the necessities imposed upon all interpreters of the 
vision itseK. Dr. Brewster, in his "Life of Sir Isaac Newton," (pp. 227, 228,) 
paraphrasing Sir Isaac's views on the subject, observes: "Some of these 
kingdoms at length fell, and new ones sprang up ; but, whatever was their 
subsequent number, they still retain the name of tJie ten kings from their first 
number." Machiavelli, in his history of Florence, quoted by bishop Newton, 
and reproduced by Dr. Keith, also gives the names of ten kingdoms, into 
which the Roman empire was dismembered by the incursions of the northern 



319 

nations. This list is as follows: 1 — the Ostrogoths (in Moesia) ; 2^— the 
Visigoths (in Pannonia) ; 3 — the Suevis and Alans (in Gascoigne and Spain) ; 
4 — the Vandals (in Africa) ; 5 — the Franks (in France) ; 6 — the Eurgundians 
(in Burgundy); 7 — the Hiruli and Turingi (in Italy); 8— the Saxons and 
Angles (in Britain) ; 9 — the Huns (in Hungary) ; 10 — the Lombards (at 
first upon the Danube and afterwards in Italy). This enumeration appears to 
differ a little from that adopted by Sir Isaac Newton, but a close comparison 
will reveal a resemblance between the two, amounting to identity. The only 
substantial difference is the exclusion of the Ostrogoths in Moesia (answering 
to the southern border of the modern empire of Austria) from the list of Sir 
Isaac Newton; but this difference is more a difference in the way of 
reckoning than in the actual enumeration of the ten kingdoms. MachiaveUi's 
may be the true list, and Newton's may be reconcilable with it, by reckoning 
the nations of the Alans one kingdom instead of two, as Sir Isaac counts 
them, which would make room for the Ostrogoths as one of the ten. On the 
other hand, it is possible, though less likely, that the Ostrogoths may have 
been part and parcel of the adjoining Visigoth state of Pannonia, on the 
eastern shore of the Adriatic, answering to the Mediterranean seaboard of 
modern Austria. In any case, the identification of the ten horns is complete. 
The process is not circumvented by minor difficulties, arising from the 
obscurities of ancient records, which can never overthrow the broad fact that 
the territory of the Roman empire, after the overthrow of the Roman imperial 
power, was divided into a number of political sections, more or less answering 
to the number ten. The diversity of race and tribe, existing in Europe at 
the time, in no way interferes with the fact of a decimal division of pohtical 
power. There were, no doubt, many more nationalities than ten ; but this no 
more disproves their political division into ten parts, than does the existence 
of the English, Scotch, and Irish in Great Britain disprove the political unity 
of the three kingdoms. The vision predicts the uprise of ten kingdoms in the 
territory of the Roman empire.' We would, therefore, argue a priori^ that 
there must have been that number in the states that made their appearance 
when the unity of the empire was dissolved, whatever the obscurity of history 
might indicate to the contrary. But, fortunately, we do no violence to history 
in believing that the vision was realized. History shows us a number of 
kingdoms, so nearly approximating to the prophetic number, that two 
independent historical writers give us the exact number; and, it must bo 
remembered that one of these two — Machiavelli — was not writing for tho 
illustration of prophecy— of which there is no reason to believe ho knew 
anything— but simply in exercise of the functions of an impartial recorder of 
historical facts. 



320 

The ten horns appeared about the fifth and sixth centuries, but were 
afterwards reduced and multiplied in number by the revolutions of war. It is 
evident, however, that they re-appear at the time that the fourth-beast system 
as a whole is destroyed by divine judgment. This is apparent by the later 
visions, seen by John in the Isle of Patmos, in which the fourth beast of Daniel 
is divided up into several beasts, for the purpose of illustrating subordinate 
and internal features of the system represented. According to these, we find 
that ten horns figure conspicuously at the end, as well as the beginning, of the 
little horn (time, times, and a half) era. — (Rev. xvii. 12, 14.) "The ten horns 
which thou sawest (on the head of the scarlet-coloured beast, verse 3) are ten 
kings which have received no kingdom as yet, but receive power as kings one 
hour with the beast. These have one mind, and shall give their power and 
strength unto the beast. These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb 
shall overcome them," &c. Here there is no mention of an eleventh horn 
plucking up three of the ten by the roots, because it refers to an entirely 
different period of history from that represented by the ten horns on the head 
of Daniel's fourth beast. It shews us the constitution and attitude of the beast 
at the time the Lamb, as the Ancient of Days, comes to give its body to the 
burning flames of destroying war, from which it appears that the original 
ten-homed phase of Daniel's fourth beast is to be resuscitated at the era of its 
destruction, and not only resuscitated, but established on the basis of corporate 
unity. That is to say, the ten kingdoms into which the fourth beast system is 
to be divided at the end, are to unite in a unanimous policy, under a single 
head. They are to give their power and strength to the little horn 
blaspheming power (separately symbolized as a scarlet-coloured beast), 
for the purpose of carrying on war against Jesus, when he has manifested 
himself in the earth as the Lion of the tribe of Judah. The beast will thus 
act once more as a living unity, but this time, a ten-homed unity — a con- 
federacy of the kings of the Roman territory, formed for the purpose of mutual 
self-defence against the power which wiU have threateningly appeared in the 
east, and of whose real nature they will be entirely ignorant, until overwhelmed 
in the fearful whirlwind of His destroying anger. — (Jer. xxx. 23, 24.) 

These facts enable us not only to reconcile Daniel's fourth beast with the 
visions of John, but to make use of all together, in forming a complete picture 
of the purpose of God, as unfolded in the past, and yet remaining to be fulfilled 
in "the end afore determined." 

They teach us that the ten-homed phase of the Roman system of nations 
has relation to two epochs in its existence ; first, when its imperial unity 
disappeared in the "fall of the Roman empire," and the second, when that 
unity is restored, for the purpose of a united effort against " that determined," 
which is to be " poured upon the desolator." 



321 

We have now to enquire if history affords any parallel to the uprise of an 
eleventh political power in the Eoman system, subsequent to the appearance of 
the ten, and of the uprooting by it of three of its predecessors, and the 
assumption by it of an arrogant dictatorial attitude toward the other powers, 
as symbolized by the eleventh horn, having a stout look and a mouth speaking 
great words of blasphemy. The merest retrospective glance affords the answer. 
The eye falls upon a power answering all the requirements of the prophecy ; 
and the eye has not to search for it. It is not a second-rate object in the 
historical retrospect. If looms up in the past with overshadowing stature ; 
it fiUs the whole picture with its imposing breadth ; its figure, though now 
stooping and decrepid as it approaches the termination of its allotted '^ time, 
times, and a half," is still conspicuous in the firmament of European politics. 
Its look is still a stout and presumptuous one ; it still thinks to change times 
and laws ; it still arrogates infallibility in the earth ; it stiU claims the power 
to dispense crowns, and dispose of the destinies of states and kingdoms ; it 
still speaks great words against the Most High; and still incarcerates in 
dungeons and tortures on the rack, all v/ho lift the feeblest testimony against 
its blasphemous pretensions, though its power in these respects is now very 
much shorn, compared to what it was in the days of its historical vigour. Do 
we require to mention the power to which these remarks apply ? Its name 
will instinctively spring to the reader's lips — The Papacy. The Papacy 
appeared in the territory of the Koman or fourth beast, afte?' the division of 
the empire by the barbarians of the north — that is (symbolically) after the ten 
horns had appeared. It was not till the beginning of the seventh century, 
that the Bishop of Home — till that time a mere diocesan, an ecclesiastic among 
other ecclesiastics — was constituted by imperial edict, universal bishop 
or pope — the supreme pontiff of the state religion. The decree whicli finally 
elevated him to this position was issued by the emperor Phocas, from Constan- 
tinople (the mouth of the dragon, which gave the Papistical beast his power, 
and his seat, and his great authority: Rev. xiii. 2). The date of the decree is 
given by one historian as A.D. 606, and another, A.D. 608, which gives a 
margin of two years' uncertainty as to the beginning, and, therefore, ending 
of the period. But the date is sufficiently definite and exact for all practical 
purposes. The appearance of the eleventh honi is, doubtless, to be reckon (hI 
from the date of the edict which constituted it a power in Europe. It is true 
it was at first merely an ecclesiastical power, but history shews that it very 
soon became a political power, exercising secular authority in the territory 
provided for it by the displacement of three of the original ten liorns, and, in 
addition to that, claiming and exercising imperial jurisdiction over contem- 
porary " crowned heads," 



322 

The plucldng up of the three horns did not precede the advent of the eleventh 
horn, but followed as the consequence of it. An interval would elapse between 
the one thing and the other. The eleventh horn would be some time erect before 
the three fell : how long is not stated. It would necessarily be very short in the 
symbol ; but then the events and times represented by the symbol were on the 
historical scale ; and, therefore, a momentary interval on the head of the beast, 
would represent an interval of years in the course of history. It is not stated 
that the three horns were plucked up before the commencement of the time, 
times and a half ; it is stated the eleventh horn prevailed for that time ; but 
this does not exclude the self-evident conclusion that the plucking up of the 
three horns would be within the period of the eleventh horn's prevalence. The 
plucking up of the three horns was in fact part of its "prevalence," and, 
therefore, would necessarily transpire within the period of its ascendancy. 
Hence, we do not find that three kingdoms were given to the Pope the moment 
he appeared, but we do find that he received them about a century afterward. 
In a work published in 1782, entitled " The History of Modern Europe., with 
an account of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, and a view of the 
progress of Society, from the rise of the Modern Kingdoms to the Peace of 
Paris, in 1763," there occurs the following statement, page 47^. "Before 
Pepin returned to France, he renewed his donation to St. Peter, yielding to 
Stephen and his successors the Exarchate ; -Amelia, now Romagna ; and 
Pentapolis, now Marca d'Ancona, with all the cities therein, to be held by 
them for ever ; the kings of France, as patricians, retaining only an ideal 
superiority, which was soon forgot. Thus was the sceptre added to the 

KEYS, THE SOVEREIGNTY TO THE PRIESTHOOD, AJSTD THE PoPES ENRICHED WITH 
THE SPOILS OF THE LoMBARD KiNGS AND THE RoMAN EmPERORS." In the 

three states here mentioned, the reader wiU recognise three of the ten king- 
doms that appeared on the declension of the empire, viz. — 1, Kavenna (the 
Exarchate) ; 2, Hiruli and Turingi (JEmelia, now Romagna) ; and 3, 
Lombardy (Pentapolis)." Dr. Keith's version of the matter is as foUows: — 
" The Exarchate of Ravenna, the kindom of the Lombards, and the state of 
Rome, were subjected to the secular dominion of the church of Rome, and, 
mainly form, to this hour, Hhe States of the Church,' over which the Pope, as 
a temporal sovereign, exercises sovereignty, and wears the ' Triple Crown,' 
as if in obvious token that three of the first kingdoms were rooted Mp before 
him." — Signs of the Times, page 22. 

The eleventh horn had eyes : it could, therefore, see the other horns ; while 
the other horns being without eyes, could not see it. What political peculiar- 
ity of the Papacy corresponds with this symbol ? Obviously its priesthood^ 
This institution exists in the territory of all the other horns, and by means 



" 323 

it, Rome is made privy to the concerns of every power in Europe ; while those 
powers are unable to penetrate the secrets of Rome, on account of the fidelity 
which the priesthood have always maintained to their ecclesiastical chief. 
History affords perpetually-iecurring illustrations of the political power which 
Papal Rome was enabled to exert in all the realms of Europe, throuo-h this 
system of espionage, which she was enabled to maintain through her priests. 

The eleventh king wasco be "diverse from the first (ten)." — (Dan. vii. 24.) 

It requires no ingenuity co make out the diversity between the Pope and the 

crowned heads of Eurci)e. The Pope does not belong to the order of kincrs. 

His appearance in E-irope was a new political phenomenon. Such a personage 

had never appeared before as a sacerdotal imperial despot, claiming not only 

the actual sovereignty of the three territories transferred to his secular 

dominion, but divinely- conferred jurisdiction over every sovereign in Europe. 

This charactfi' was not assumed by the Roman Pontiffs all at once, but it had 

grown to fi4 development before the Papacy was more than two centuries old. 

In the dap of Pope G-regory VII, it ripened to maturity. Of this Pope it is 

recorded ^at " he engaged the Church in an open war with the sovereigns of 

all nations." He formed a purpose to " engage in the bond of fidelity and 

allegiai-s, to the Vicar of Christ, as king of kings, and lord of lords, all the 

jpoteniitcs of the earth, and to establish at Rome an annual assembly of 

bisho'S, by whom the contests which might arise between kingdoms and 

gove'^ign states, were to be decided — the pretensions of princes to be examined, 

an(?fche fate of nations and empires to be determined." So far did he succeed 

injtis scheme of supremacy, that Henry IV, Emperor of Germany, w4iom he 

hi summoned to his presence as a delinquent, applied for absolution at the 

^tes of Canosa, a fortress in the Appenines, where Gregory happened to bo 

asident at the time, " and being stripped of his robes, and, wrapt in sackcloth, 

le was obliged to remain in an outer court three days, in the month of 

January, bare-footed and fasting, before he was permitted to kiss the feet of 

His Holiness. The haughty pontiff condescended to grant him absolution, 

after he had sworn obedience to His Holiness in all things." Gregory, elated 

by his triumph, and now looking upon himself, not altogether without reason, 

as the lord and master of all the crowned heads in Christendom, said in several 

of his letters which were written at the time, that it was his duty to '' pull 

down the pride of kings." In accordance with this sentiment, ho wrote to 

Solomon, a refractory king of Hungary, " You ought to know tlie kingdom of 

Hungary belongs to the Roman Church ; and learn that you will incur the 

indignation of the Holy See, if yoti do not achnowlcflgo that you hold your 

dominions of the Pope, and not of the Einjjeror." lie subsecpK^ntly deposed 

Henry IV, in tlie words " In the name of Almighty God, und by your (tho^ 



324 

council's) authority, I prohibit Henry, the son of our Emperor Henry, from 
governing the Teutonic Eangdom and Italy ; I release all Christians from 
their oath of allegiance to him, and I strictly forbid all persons from serving 
or attending him as king." He appointed a successor to Henry, oneRodolph, 
and sent him a golden crown, with an address, In which, after depriving 
Henry of strength in comhat, and condemning him rever to be mctorions^ he 
delivers himself of the following apostrophe to Peter and Paul, in which the 
nature of his pretensions as their pretended succes?or, becomes apparent: 
*' Make all men sensible that as you can bind and loose everything in heaven, 
you can also upon earth take from oe give to every oie, according to his 
deserts, empires, kingdoms, principalities. Let the kings and 'princes of the age 
then instantly feel your power, that they may not dare to desp'^e the orders of 
your church." These sentiments Gregory VII left as an ht^itage to his 
successors, and they have continued to be the animating spirit o\ the Roman 
See to the present day, illustrating the statement of the vision that t\Q eleventh 
horn, with eyes, should be '^diverse from the first (ten)," and shoild have a 
look more stout than his fellows 

The horn had a mouth. This indicates that it would in some sense Resume 
to speak to the others, and the speaking could not be for the purpose of Jiutual 
deliberation, because the others had no mouths, and therefore no conver^tion 
could take place : the speaking, therefore, could only take the form of legisltive 
dictation : the eleventh horn would presume to make law to the others, ""he 
applicability of this to the Papacy is abundantly manif estedin the last paragra,2i. 

The words it spoke were "great words against the Most High," not worg 
in the verbal sense: "words" here has a more comprehensive significatio, 
than the dictionary meaning. It imports the policy of the power spoken of, a^ 
represented and expressed by its utterances over the whole period of its 
existence. These are "the words" by which the indignation that destroys 
the beast is evoked. Now these words in order to be " against the Most High," 
need not to be verbally directed against Him. They need not take the form of 
denunciations of the Almighty. In the scriptural sense, everything uttered 
against the truth is uttered against the Almighty, though it may lie couched 
in the language of allegiance. Hence, for the Papacy to " speal. great words 
against the Most High," it is not necessary for her to have formally 
fulminated her denunciations against the Deity. If her ecclesiastical creed and 
her ecclesiastical policy have practically involved the repudiation of His truth 
and His people, her " words " have been none the less, but aU the more, 
" against the Most High " for being framed in the language of sanctimonious 
pretence. 

We have only to enquire whether the policy of Rome has or has not been 



325 

one ot arrogant, presumptuous, and destructive opposition to everything in 
which the name and honour of Grod are involved ; and we have not to go far 
for the answer. No one having any knowledge of history, and any under- 
standing of the truth, can be ignorant that Papal Home has, from the 
beginning of its days, "spoken great words against the Most High," and 
" made war with and prevailed against the saints." Her career, since the day her 
bishop was crowned universal Dictator-ecclesiastical, has been an unbroken 
chapter of enormities perpetrated against Grod and man. During the long 
period of her ascendancy, now measuring nearly 1,260 years, she has well 
merited the designation bestowed upon her by the spirit in vision to John, in 
the Isle of Patmos. She has been the sum of all abomination — the hold of 
every foul spirit — the " mother of harlots and of the abominations of the 
EARTH." — (Rev. xvii. 5.) She is well styled " mystery,' ' and more appropriately 
still, the "mystery of iniquity." — (2 Thess. ii. 7.) She has been iniquity 
mystified — iniquity veiled — iniquity dressed in a robe of religious pretence — 
iniquity tricked out in the splendid paraphernalia of regal pomp and civil 
authority — iniquity of the deepest dye, draped in holy garments — a whited 
sepulchre of mystified iniquity, shewing a beautiful exterior, and inviting all 
nations to worship at its cursed shrine of "rottenness and dead men's bones ; " 
and all nations have gone and bowed the knee, and garnished this grave of the 
saints with costly things, proving themselves the seed of the accursed rejectors 
of Jesus, who honoured the tombs of the prophets, and thereby were held by 
Jesus to be the proved accomplices of those who killed them, and put them in 
their graves. 

The Little Horn impostures— this proud, wilful, stout-looking, pretentious, 
audacious, blasphemous, saint-kiUing power, which has prevailed against all 
divine things for twelve centuries, in accordance with the words of Daniel— 
this depraved, hypocritical, corrupt, iniquitous, tyrannical, and murderous 
Church of Rome, with which it is now becoming fashionable at religious^ 
meetings to bandy compliments, and speak respectful of, and which blinded 
andbecrazed "charity" would make room for, and deal HberaUy with, as an 
institution " doing good " in its own way, and " advancing the cause of Christ 
under the banners of the Catholic religion;" this execrable mistress of 
witchery, whose cunning arts of simulated kindness, and ornaments of learning 
and fascinations of venerable pedigree, are, in England, entrapping thousands 
upon thousands into the bondage, which it was the boast of this country to 
have escaped three hundred years ago— this system of unmixed initpiity is 
further introduced to our notice in Rev. xvii. 3, 4, as a gaudy, betrinkcticd, 
whorish woman, drunk with the blood of saints, and liaving in lier liand a cup 
of abominable liquor, with which she intoxicates kings. The appropriateness 



326 

of this figure will be seen at a glance. The Church of Rome pretends to be 
the faithful spouse of the absent bridegi'oom ; whereas she acts the part of a 
prostitute of the most profligate and abandoned type. She coquets with the 
kings of the earth, and administers to them free libations of her bemuddling 
doctrines, with which " all nations are drunk." She commits fornication with 
them, for her loves and her aims are confined to the worldly objects she can 
accomplish in her ecclesiastical dealings with them. She revels in lust and 
lucre, and is drenched in all her garments with the reeking blood of the 
righteous slain, whom she has put to death for their testimony. 

This LiTTLE-HoEX blaspheming, prevailing power, is further spoken of as a 
" king doing according to his will" (Dan. xi. 36), exalting and magnifying 
himself above every power (Heb., «?7,) and speaking marvellous things against 
the God of gods ; which is an exact description of the Pope's presumption, 
as historically illustrated. It is said he should not regard the God of his fathers 
nor the desire of women. This is also descriptive of him. The emperors of 
Rome — the "fathers" or predecessors of the Pope — were Pagans, and 
worshipped the deities of Pagan mythology. The Pope disregarded these, 
and set up a God which the emperors " knew not," viz., the triune God of 
their superstition, and the Virgin Mary, whom they " honoured with gold 
and silver, and precious stones," in erecting begemmed and garnished 
temples to their worship. He was to " disregard the desire of women." 
He should be a celibate, " forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain 
from meats." — (1 Tim. iv. 3.) How signally this has been fulfilled, history 
testifies. The whole hierarchy of Rome, from the Pope in " the chair of 
St. Peter" to the mendicant friar, are under a bond to remain in 
bachelorhood, and thus they set at naught the " desire of women," and fulfil 
the prophecy. ''He shall magnify himself above all," and '^ shall prosper 
till the indignation be accomplished." His existence and supremacy will, 
therefore, continue till the return of Christ; for the indignation is not 
accomplished until he come to " tread the winepress of the fierceness of the 
wrath of Almighty God (Rev. xix. 15), and to pour out the wine of His 
wrath into the cup of His indignation, without mixture." — (Rev. 14, 10.) 

These prophecies are reproduced by Paul in 2 Thess. ii. 3-10. The church 
at Thessalonica had been agitated with ideas of the imminence of Christ's 
appearing. Paul writes to quiet their apprehensions on the subject, and 
reminds them of what he had told them while he was with them (verse 5), 
namely, that before the day of Chiist would come, there should be a 
wide-spread departure from the truth, and a subsequent and consequent 
development of " that Man of Sin, the son of perdition, who opposeth and 

EXALTETH HDI^SELF ABOVE ALL that lo CALLED GOD, OT that IS 7VOrshij)2}edy SO 



327 

that he, as God, sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is 
God." These words of Paul amount to a paraphrase of the words of Daniel. 
There is, however, a feature in them which is lacking in Daniel's representa- 
tion of the matter. Paul connects the development of the "Man of Sin" with 
the " falling away " that was to come, and intimates by the concatenation of 
his words, that the one was to result from the other — that the revelation of 
the "Man of Sin" was to be the result of the falling away from the truth. 
This is an important addition to the information communicated by Daniel, 
without which the identification of the power represented would not have 
been so much a matter of certainty as it is. There is nothing in Daniel to 
indicate that the appearance of the little horn of the fourth beast was 
to be connected with God's operations among men by the truth. For 
anything there is in Daniel to the contrary, the little horn might have 
represented a heathen power, like Babylon, or like the original ten horns, 
having no germinal connection with anything pertaining to God ; but, by 
Paul's words, we are enabled to see that this little horn was to be the 
political offspring of an apostacy which was to take place among thoi>e 
professing the truth of Christ. This leads us straight to the Papacy, for the 
fact is notorious that the Papacy which has ruled the political and eccle- 
siastical destinies of Etirope for twelve centuries, is nothing more nor less than, 
the political incoiporation of the principles developed as the result of a 
departure from the truth, on the part of the early professing Christians. 
In the Papacy, therefore, we behold the MAN OF SIN predicted by Paul, 
and the system which is to be "consumed with the spirit of his (Christ's) 
mouth, and destroyed with the brightness of his coming." So long as the 
brethren, as a whole, were faithful to the truth, it was impossible for this 
Man of Sin to be revealed, and, therefore, it was impossible for Christ's 
coming to take place, because the coming of Christ was to occur for tho 
destruction of the Man of Sin. 

There was another obstacle in the way at the time that Paul wrote. " Yo 
know," says he, "what withholdeth, that he might be revealed in liis time." 
The "Man of Sin" was to be the supreme power in the state. Before this 
could be accomplished. Paganism in high places had to be abolished. Tlio 
Pope as the professed "Vicar of Jesus Christ," claiming to be "King of 
Kings and Lord of Lords," could never be politically developed in Europe 
until the Roman empire was revolutionized, and changed from a Pagan to a 
professed Christian power. The Paganism of Rome, was, therefore, an 
obstruction. It was "that withholding" tho revelation of "the Man of 
Sin." But the hindrance was to bo "taken out of tho way," and "tiikm 
Bhall that wicked be revealed," &c. We know, as a matter of hit^lory, tliat 



828 



was ■ 



paganism, in due time, was taken out of the way, and that the way was 
thereby opened for the uprise of the Little Horn on the head of the fourth or 
Homan (symbolic) beast, which, as "a Man of Sin," should prevail against 
the saints for 1,260 years, and exalt himself in the earth above every object of 
worship. 

There are some who hold that this " Man of Sin " is a particular person — an 
individual of extraordinary audacity and impiety, who has yet to appear and 
theoretically abjure the existence of the Almighty, and offer himself to ail the 
world as the object of worship. But such take an extremely narrow and 
utterly untenable view of the matter. All they rely upon is the phrase " Man 
of Sin;" but this no more proves the personality of the power referred to, 
than do Paul's other words, "the Old Man," prove that he meant a literal 
octogenarian, whose company we were to avoid, in "putting off the old 
man and his deeds." If the "he" applied to the Man of Sin, prove the 
personality of the power referred to, what is to be made of the " he " 9;pplied 
to the " what withholdeth .^ " ^'IL:e who 7iow Ictteth (or hlndereth) will let 
(or hinder) vntil He be taken out of the way.'' There was a " He " existing 
in Paul's days, obstructing the development of the "Man of Sin," and who 
was in due time to be removed to make way for his impious successor. Who 
was this ? Let the individualists answer. Was there a particular' man living 
in Paul's day, whose death or deposition was necessary to the appearance of 
the " Man of Sin? " If the answer is "Yea," who was it ? and how is it that 
eighteen hundred years have elapsed since his death, and yet the "Man of Sin" 
of the individualist has never made his appearance ? A full confrontage of 
this difficulty wiU demolish the individual theory. The obstruction in the way 
of Paul's Man of Sin was the faithfulness of the brotherhood, and the political 
supremacy of Paganism. Both these barriers vanished in course of time, and 
up rose, in the historical arena, that monstrosity which has overshadowed the 
historic page with records of transcendant cruelty and iniquity. A pontifical 
tyrant and priestly despot, a presumptuous, grasping, arrogant, blasphemous, 
lustful, wicked ruler, pretending to be the divinely-authorised disposer of the 
political and religious affairs of all mankind, while himself the meanest 
upstai-t, the most contemptible of selhsh and abominable oppressors. His- 
torically, he is absolutely the Man of Sin, for throughout all the generations 
of the Papacy, the Pope has been the only man in the earth in his position. 
The system of the Papacy is essentially a One-Man system. The theory of 
the system does not admit of more than a sing-le head. It has happened once 
or twice that there have been rival popes, but this was an anomaly never 
sanctioned by the system. Politically, the Pope is the "Man of Sin," 
whoever the Pope may happen to be. The individuality of the man is 



329 

entirely absorbed in the position. No individual man is essential to constitute 
the Po2)eslii2). The Popeship has always found a man to fill it, whoever has 
lived or died, which shows that it is the office or position which Paul 
contemplated when he spoke of the revelation of the " Man of Sin." One man 
filled the " Man-of-Sin " office when that which hindered was taken out of the 
way; and another entirely different man will be in it when Jesus is 
manifested to destroy the whole system. 

Those who individualize and futurize the "Man of Sin," are in the habit also 
of literalizing the period of the Little Horn's prevalence. " Time, times, and a 
half," to them are literal three-and-a-half years, at some undiscoverable time in 
the future, during which " the Anticheist " of their theory will appear on the 
scene, rise to the summit of universal power, and come to his end by divine 
interposition. Plow this theory can be entertained by an intelligent mind on 
a full review of the bearings of the case, it is difficult to conceive. It involves 
several anomalies of the most palpable kind. In the first place, if the time, 
times, and a half of Daniel's fourth beast are literal and future, of course the 
Httle horn represents a power yet to appear ; and, in that case, the political 
visions shewn to Daniel and John take no notice of the greatest political 
phenomenon of the fourth-beast pei'iod of the world's history. Daniel is shewn 
the fourth beast, and told about the fourth-beast kingdom, and put in 
possession of details respecting it, but is withheld all information of the most 
prominent, extraordinary, and longest-lived feature of the system, viz., the 
Papacy. The most astounding phase of the fourth-beast history is left out of the 
symbolism of the fourth-beast period ! He receives no information of a persecut- 
ing regal imposture, which should lift its head and voice over all the kings of the 
Continent, for more than 1,260 years, and trample under foot the truth and the 
friends of the truth all that time ; but he, is particularly enlightened A\'ith 
reference to an insignificant three years and a half, during which a d;iring 
man is only to equal (for he could not surpass) the impiety and cruelty exhib- 
ited by the Roman Pontifi's for more than a half-score centuries ! The 
suggestion has only to be made to be condemned. How utterly incongruous, 
that in a symbol, confessedly extending over a chronological period of 2,000 
years, an incident of ordy three and a. half literal years* duration should 
receive a place as its most conspicuous feature — a period of utter insignifi- 
cance as history goes. Again, such an assumption would make the vision 
teach that the saints 'were not to he prevailed against in the course of 
history^ except during TiriiEE and a hale years at its close, and 
would place in a curious positi(m the fact, th.-it as a matter of history, the 
Papacy has spoken great words against the Most High, and prevailed against 
the saints for a period oe upwards oe 1/200 years. JJcsidcs, of what tocrvico 



330 

would the vision bo, if its applicability were confined to a single oppressor, and 
a period of three years and a half at the close of history ? especially as it is 
denied by those who maintain this thfeory, that there is any cine to ftie time 
when the Man of Sin may be expected to appear. As it could in that case 
only interest those contemporary with that epoch, it would throw the vision 
into the corner, as a thing destitute of spiritual utility for all time, and only 
possessing the kind of interest attaching to any prodigy — a view of the matter 
eminently derogatory to God, in view of the fact that it was communicated by 
him for enlightenment, encouragement, and guidance. 

The literal theory is puerile and untenable. It is utterly unworthy of 
consideration, and can never be entertained where a broad and competent 
view of the facts is taken. The historical view of the matter, which is " the 
truth of the matter," gives utility and importance to the vision. We read in 
it the consoling assurance that " the Most High ruleth in the kingdoms of 
men," and that the " practising and prospering " of human wickedness and 
presumption in the earth, has a determined end — that the triumphing of the 
wicked, like the waves of the sea, has an appointed bound that it cannot pass 
— ^that the times of the Gentiles are fixed and defined, and that sifanding where 
we are, we can look forward with intelligent expectation to their early expiry, 
and the glorious manifestation of the Ancient of Days, in righteousness to 
judge and make war, and to destroy them that destroy the earth. 

With righteous triumph may we hail the day of Rome's perdition. Her 
history shows a dark and dreadful retrospect. No language can adequately 
depict the enormity of her crimes. The Pagan murderer of the apostles, the 
Papal blasphemer of the truth, and destroyer of the saints, "Great Babylon," 
has heaped to herself wrath against the day of wrath. Her crimes are without 
number, and vsdthout measure. Por a long period of centuries she has pre- 
vailed against everything divine. She has waged open war against the Word 
of God. She has done her utmost to extirpate it from among mankind. She 
has made the study of it a crime, and the possession of it a capital offence. 
She has trampled the truth under her feet, and drenched the earth with the 
blood of unresisting victims, who loved it, and counted not their lives dear 
unto them in defence of it. She has invented and estabhshed every kind of 
abomination in doctrine and practice. For ages she has held up a mortal man 
as an object of universal adoration, above all on earth called God, or worship- 
ped. To this living idol she has commanded the ascription of more than mortal 
honours, and ordered all who would not bow down to the image, to be cast 
into the furnace of fiery affliction, of persecution, bonds, imprisomnents, and 
death. She has deified the ghost of a dead woman, and commanded the world ' 
to worship "the Queen of Heaven/' under the blasphemous title of "the 



331 

Mother of God." She has burlesqued and brought to mockery the truth of 
the miraculous conception. She has enjoined prayer to dead men, and taught 
men to look to them for guardianship. The world, drunk with the wine of her 
abomination, has responded to the injunction, and elected their "patron 
saints," to whom they address their ignorant devotions, and whose guardian- 
ship they invoke upon the temples of their superstition, by calling them after 
their names. She has changed the memorials of Christ's death into objects of 
worship, telling her dupes that the touch of her lying priests transmutes the 
emblematic bread and wine into the veritable essence of Christ's nature ; and 
she has degraded the intelligent observance of the institution, commanded for 
the affectionate participation of all the members of Christ's household, into a 
scene of superstitious and meaningless mummery, enacted by her foul-handed 
priests. She holds up as objects of faith and acts of obedience, dead men's 
bones, musty relics, crosses, genuflexions, bodily penances ; and exacts money 
from the pockets of her dupes on the iniquitous pretence of imparting spiritual 
benefit. She has descended to the unutterable infamy of selling licentiousness 
for gain — pretending to give liberty to sin with impunity, for money — blas- 
phemously professing to avert the course of eternal justice for a consideration 
in cash ! She has invented the chimera of purgatory, and befooled the deluded 
masses of mankind into the belief that she had power, for money, to liberate 
" departed souls " from its custody. There is no religious folly of which she 
has not been guilty. She has arrogated the power to forgive sins, and by her 
priests in "the Confessional," has enforced the most execrable inquisition into 
the private affairs of her devotees, especially women, in whose "spiritual 
interests " her celibate scoundrels have professed a solicitation, which has only 
been the cloak of their lust. She has established nests of infamy throughout 
the world, in the name of spiritual purity and seclusion ; and in convents and 
nunneries, carries on secret abominations and cruelties, of which the unutter- 
able heinousness will only be fully known when " Great Babylon comes into 
remembrance before God," and the time arrives to give unto her "double for 
all her sins." She has decreed the heathen fi(jtion of the immortality of the 
soul to be the cardinal point of the Christian faith, and has exalted the Pagan 
dreams of Hell and Elysian Fields, to the same eminence. She has turned 
away from the truth, and given heed to fables. She has made lies her refuge. 
She knoweth nothing of the gospel of the kingdom of God. She repudiates 
the promises made unto the Fathers. She subverts and sets aside tlie doctrine 
of the name of Christ, as a suffering in the flesh of the penalty duo to the 
flesh, in order to a resurrection to incorruptibility. 

From the sole of the foot to the crown of the head, slio is one mass of 
spiritual putrefaction ; and when to this is added her great swelling words oi 



332 

vanity, her proud looks, and rapacious deeds, her wicked principles and cruel 
acts, her malignant hostility to the truth in every shape and form, and her 
implacable persecution by rack torture, fire and death, of all who professed it, 
whom she could get into her power, and the picture of her enormities is 
complete. Yet, like the adulterous woman, " she wipeth her mouth, and saith, 
I am innocent." In the language imputed to her in the Apocalypse, she says 
" I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow." — (Rev. xviii. 7.) 
"Well might the servants of God be represented, as crying, " How long, O Lord, 
holy and true ? " Such a triumph of iniquity in the earth is well-nigh beyond 
the capacity of human forbearance ; but our patience is strengthened by the 
word which God has sent, " that His servants might know the things which 
must shortly come to pass." Through it, as tlirough a telescope, we see the 
coming retribution, and we hear the murmuring echoes of that mighty poean 
of triumph, which will ascend from countless tongues, like the noise of a 
tumult of waters: "Alleluia! Salvation, and honour, and glory, and power 
unto the Lord our God, for true and righteous are His judgments ; for He 
hath judged the great whore which did corrupt the earth with her fornication^ 
and hath avenged the blood of His servants at her hands.^^ — (Rev. xix. 1, 2.) 

The sound of this song of triumph is very near, even at the door. Another 
generation will not pass before its joyous peals will burst upon the world, 
"Time, times, and a haK" of years are nearly up. This year, next year, or 
the year after, will probably see the end of the 1260 years of Rome^s supremacy, 
which commenced in 606-8, and with the end of her allotted time, comes the 
swift and decisive sword of divine justice. " Her sins have reached unto 
heaven^ and God hath remembered her iniquities, • . . Therefore 
shall her plagues come in one day — death, and mourning, and famine — and 
she shall be utterly burned with fire, for strong is the Lord God that judgeth 
her." — (Rev. xviii. 8) "The Lord will consume her with the spiiit of His 
mouth, and destroy her with the brightness of his coming." — (2 Thess. ii. 8.) 

Being at the end of the prophetic periods, are there any events extant in the 
world at the present moment indicative of the fact ? Li answering this question, 
we desire to draw attention to what has been revealed in reference to the 
events attendant upon "the latter days." We begin by quoting Rev. xvi. 12, 
IG, where this matter is the subject of symbol. 

" And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates ; and the 
water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared. 
And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, and 
out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet ; for they 
are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the 
earth, and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God 
Almighty. (Behold, I come as a thief; blessed is he that watcheth, and ^eepeth his 
garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.) And he gathered them 
together unto a place called in the Hebrew tongue, Armageddon." 



The main feature of this testimony is a predicted gathering of nations t- a 
war in which God Almighty (through the Lord Jesus Christ, who arrives on 
earth like a thief, before the conflict commences,) is to take a part. 

There are, however, certain signs preceding the gathering, which demand 
our attention. There is, first, the drying up of the river Euphrates, - that the 
way of the kings of the east may be prepared." Now, we cannot take this to 
mean the Hteral evaporation of the river known by that name ; because there 
would be no connection between such an event and the preparation of " the way 
of the kings of the east," or sun-rising, whoever we take these to be. There 
are only two classes that answer to the designation, viz.:-the saints and- the 
Jews; the first being the kings of a future age,-having their origin and 
constitution in Christ, the great rising sun of righteousness, who is to re-appear 
m the east, and subjugate the world from that quarter ; and the second, being 
the royal eastern nation, or lords of the east. If we suppose that *' the king^^ 
of the east " of the testimony, are the saints, we are at once precluded from 
the literal view of '' the river Euphrates," for how should the di^ying up of a 
river be necessary to make way for those who shall be " cav^ht up (or'snatched 
away) to meet the Lord in the air ? " If, on the other hand, we assume that 
it is the Jews who are meant, (and the truth is, it means both, for they are part 
and parcel of the same system of things,) the idea of literahty of the river is 
equally untenable ; because the Jews are principally scattered in Europe and 
America, and in their restoration will come " in the ships of Tarshish first,"— 
(Isaiah Ix. 9,) and be brought " on horses and in chariots, and in litters, and 
upon mules, and upon swift beasts, for an offering to the holy mountain of tho 
Lord at Jerusalem."— (Isaiah Ixvi. 20.) It is true that the ten tribes are 
supposed to be scattered " beyond the river (Euphrates)." but where natural 
means of transport are available, we need not expect the intervention of 
miracle. However, the question is, what does the statement of the prophecy 
mean ? Turning to the prophets, we find rivers frequently chosen to represent 
nations, powers, armies, &c. Y\^e read in Isaiah viii. 7, for instance : " Behold 
the Lord bringeth upon them the waters of the river, strong and many, even the 
KING OF Assyria, and all his glory." In this case, the Assyrian power is 
aguratively represented by the river which irrigated the territory on whirli 
it was estabhshed, viz.:-the Euphrates, which was designated ''the river." 
Again, in Isaiah xviii. where the Jews are the subject of discourse, we find 
:he following phrase, " whose land the rivers have spoiled," referring to tho 
-epeated mihtary invasions of Palestine ; for we never heard of watery inim- 
iations in that part of the world. Hence also, " many waters " ai'c cxplaint^d 
:o mean "peoples and multitudes, nations and tongues."— (Rev. xvii. 15.) 
Now in view of these considerations, it is legitimate to arguo that " tho 



334 

river Euphrates " dried up by the sixth vial, is intended to signify that power 
which is located on the territory to which it pertains, at the time contemporary 
with the pouring out of the sixth vial. If this is admitted, the interpretation 
would at once fix upon Turkey as the power represented; because she occupies 
the territory in question at the present time when the events of the prophecy 
are near their fulfilment. If so, the meaning of the symbol is, that the 
political life of the Turkish empire will die out as a necessary preparation for 
the way of the kings of the east. The fitness of this interpretation is at once 
apparent, when we remember that Turkey holds the land of the Jew in servile 
possession, precluding him from possessing soil in his own land," and refusing 
to guarantee him the ordinary privileges of its heathen denizens; because, 
until the Turkish power is removed out of the way, until this political 
Euphrates is dried up, the restoration of the Jews— the kings of the east— is, 
humanly speaking, impossible. Hence, the necessity for its evaporation, as 
predicted in the vision. 

The next sign connected with the development of the end, was seen by John 
in the issuing of " three unclean spirits, like frogs, out of the mouth of the 
drao'on, out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false 
prophet." The three sources of issue first demand attention. The beast is 
said to have had " seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his 
head."— (Rev. xiii. 1.) This is interpreted in chap. xvii. 9, as follows : " The 
seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth (the woman 
being explained as that great city which reignethover the kings of the earth,'' 
verse 18) and there are seven kings. . . And the ten horns which thou 
sawest are ten kings which have received no kingdom as yet," &c. (v. 9.) 
Here it is evident that " the beast " is representative of a looliiical orgamza- 
tion, and not descriptive of the reptilious monstrosity suggested by a literal 
construction of the symbol. This being so, "the mouth of the beast" must 
also be political ; and we must seek for its equivalent in the beast-system, as 
politically manifested. By this rule, we select the capital city as being the 
mouth of the state, both as to the exposition of its policy, and as to its corporate 
nourishment. Now on this principle of interpretation, which is suggested by 
the explanation contained in the vision itself, the mouth of the dragon, beast, 
and false prophet signify the capital cities of the political systems severaUy 
represented by these symbols ; and all that is necessary to identify them is, to 
ascertain what systems are symbolised by "the dragon, the beast, and the 
false prophet." This cannot be done without going largely into history, 
which is impossible within the short Hmits of a lecture. The reader is, there- 
fore, referred to Eljyis Israel and Eureka, by Dr. Thomas, advertised onafly- 
Bheet of this edition. It will be of advantage here to state the results of the 



335 

exposition. The dragon is shown to be the Eastern Eoman Empire, having 
Constantinople as its capital ; the beast, the "Western Empire, having Vienna 
as its representative mouth ; and the false prophet, that absurdity in Christen- 
dom, the ecclesiastical tyrant of Rome, from which, as '^his mouth," he 
fulminates his blasphemous " bulls," and gives forth his false pretensions to 
spiritual unction and infallibility. 

The mouths, then, from which the unclean spirits issue, are Constantinople, 
Vienna, and Eome. Vf hat are those spirits? They are like frogs. This cannot 
mean a resemblance to the little mud reptiles which inhabit marshes ; because 
these creatures are devoid of intelligent quality ; hence, a policy issuing from 
a political month could never be said to resemble them. The mouths being 
political, the frog-Kkeness must have a political significance likewise ; but 
where shall we seek for anything political connected with three frogs ? "Well, 
it is a fact that the original arms of France consisted of three frogs^ of which 
any one may satisfy himself by consulting French history. Here is a clue. 
If the spirit has selected the dragon — the first heraldic symbol of the Eastern 
Eoman empire — to represent the modern phase of that empire, does it not 
seem appropriate that the original national symbol of France should be selected 
to represent her, when the occasion occurred to introduce her into the scene ? 
Only one answer can be given, and that answer brings a moral certainty with 
it, that France is brought before us in the three frogs seen by John. This 
being so, the explanation of the phenomenon seen by John is this, — that a 
French-inspired policy should issue from Constantinople, Vienna, and Eome, 
causing a gathering of nations to the final war of the great day of God 
Almighty. Here, then, are two notable signs to be looked for, as indicative of 
the approach of the end. 1st — The decadence of the Turkish empire, and 2nd 
— the predominance of French influence at the great political council board of 
Europe. "Who can fail to see that these two signs are now conspicuously 
exhibited on the Continent ? Turkey is rapidly falling to pieces ; and the French 
Emperor is next to all-powerful. He is the master of the situation, and has been 
for many years. He was instrumental in bringing about the recent wars that 
have disturbed the peace of Europe. In the confidence inspired by French 
assurance of support, the Sultan of Turkey declared war against Eussia; thus 
the unclean frog-like spirit proceeded out of the mouth of the dragon. Provoked 
by the belligerent attitude of the French government as the instigator of 
Sardinia, Austria declared war against the latter; and thus the unclean spirit 
was caused to issue from the mouth of the beast. It now remains to issue from 
Eome, as the mouth of the false prophet; and however unlikely this may seem 
at present, it will certainly come to pass. The Pope will certainly be encouraged 
to declare war by-and-by, which, in all probability, he will do under French 



336 

inspiration ; and the ultimate effect wiR be to give politics an eastern direction. 
The Holj Land will become the centre of interest. The gathering at 
Armageddon must be looked for ; and this will come of European complica- 
tions, although there might seem to be no connection between the two things. 
While the powers of Europe are cutting each others' throats, as the result of 
the frog-influence emanating from the Pope (or the declaration of war from 
Rome), Russia appears upon the scene in^the character of a European 
conqueror, making an easy prey of the contending states. This appears from 
Daniel xi. 40, 41, 44, 45 ; xii. 1 : — 

" At the time of the end . . . the king of the north shall come against 

him (viz., against the power mentioned in the previous verse, as occupying and 
dividing the Holy Land for gain, v*-hich is Turkey), like a whirhvind, with chariots 
and with horsemen, and with many ships, and He shall enter into the countries, and 
shall overflow and pass over. He shall enter also into the glorious land, and many coun- 
TRIES shall he overthrown. . . . He shall go forth with great fury, to destroy and 
utterly to make away many. He shall plant the tabernacle of His palaces, between the 
seas, in the glorious holy mountain ; yet He shall come to His end, and none shall help 
Eim : (for) at that tiiie shall Michael stand up, the great prince that standeth 
for the children of thy people; and there shall he a time of trouhle, such as never was 
since there ivas a nation even to that same time." 

In proof that the victorious invading power described in this testimony as 
*'the king of the north," is Russia, let it be observed that it comes against 
another power that is in occupation of the Holy Land. That power is Turkey, 
as must be obvious to everyone from the facts of the case. Isow the king of 
the north, in relation to Turkey, and to every other country in the world, is the 
Emperor of R^.r^sia. In a peculiar and absolute sense, that potentate answers 
to the description of the prophecy ; for his empire girdles the northern zone 
almost of Loth hemispheres, constituting him, in an exclusive sense, " the 
king of the north." This is still more evident from Ezekiel xxxviii. where 
vre read, commencing V&t verse — 

" And the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, set thy face against 
Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against 
him, and say, ' Thus saith the Lord God: Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief 
prince of Meshech and Tubal ; and I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws; 
and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed 
with all sorts of armour, even a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them 
handling swords : Persia, Ethiopia, and Lyhia with them; all of them with shield and 
helmet : Gomer and all his hands, the house of Togarmah, of the north quarters, and all his 
bands: and many people ivith thee. Be thou prepared, and prepare for thyself, thou and 
all thy company that are assembled unto thee, and he thou a guard unto tliem. After 
many days shalt thou be visited :in the latteb yiiars thou shalt come into the land 
that is brought hack from the sword, and is gathered out of many people against tke 
mountaccs of Israel, which have been always waste : but it is brought forth out of 
the nations, and they shall dwell safely, all of them. Thou shalt ascend and come 
like a storm, thou shalt be like a cloud to cover the land, thou and all thy 
bands, and many people with thee." — Averse 14.) In that day when my people of 



337 

Israel dwelleth safely, shalt thou not know it. And thon shalt come from tliy place 
out of the north parts, thou and many people with thee, all of them riding upon 
horges— a great company and a mighty army ; and thou shalt come up against my 
people Israel, as a cloud to cover the land : IT SHALL BE IN THE LATTER 
DA'YS; and I will bring thee against my land, that the heathen may know me 
when I shall be sanctified in thee, O Gog, before their eyes." 

The evidence tliat the potentate addressed in this prophecy is the Emperor 

of Hussia is overwhelming. First, there is something in the use of the phrase, 

" Gog in the land of Magog." If you turn to any map of the ancient world, 

you wiU find that the land of Magog — taking its name from Magog, the son of 

Japheth, who was the first settler — lies in the northern part of Europe, and is 

now embraced in the modern Russian Empire. Secondly, the phrase " the chief 

prince of Meshech and Tubal," points in the same direction. You will also 

find those ancient territorial names to be descriptive of countries now 

incorporated with Russia, and now modified into the names Muscovy and 

Tobolski. Thirdly, the remark ^' thou shalt come from thy place in the north 

parts^^' is conclusive confirmation, showing beyond all doubt, that the land of 

Magog, and the provinces of Meschech and Tubal are geographically situated 

in the realms of the Emperor of Eussia. This being established, let us note 

the points of coincidence between Ezekiel's "Gog of the land of Magog," 

and Daniel's " King of the North." The one appears " at the time </ tho 

end; " the other 'Hn the latter days."' The one is " the king of the north; " 

the other " comes out of his place in the north parts' The one overflows 

many countries, and enters into the glorioles land; the other, "^ith many 

people of his steps, comes against the mountain of Israel Like a cloud to cover 

the land;" the one ^^ comes to his end with none to help him;'' the other 

meets with retribution described in the following words : — 

" I will call for a sword against him throughout all my mountains ; saith the Lord 
God: every man's sword shall be against his brother, and I will plead against 
him with pestilence and with hJood ; and I will rain upon him and upon his bands, 
and upon the many people that are with him, an overflowing rain, and great hailstones, 
fire, and brimstone." — Ezck. xxxviii. 21. 22. 

Thus, the points of resemblance are complete, both as to time, events, and 
issue. In both cases, the contemporary supremacy of Russia is foretold ; in 
both, is the smiting of her power supernatural. She is to vanquish many 
countries, and hold a protectorate over them, as indicated by the words, " Bo 
thou a guard unto them." Those countries include all the nations of tho 
Continent. " Gom^er and all his bands, the house of Togarmali of the north 
quarters," will be found, on reference to ancient geography, to embraoo 
nearly every country in Europe ; and, in addition to these, there are " Persia, 
Ethiopia, and Lybia with them," showiiift- that at this time, Russia will have 
attained to something like universal dominion, rrcvious to this full develop- 



833 

ment of her power, the Je^rs will have been the subjects of partial 
restoration. They are represented as baring been '' brought forth out ^of the 
nations," and as having gotten cattle and goods, and "dwelling safely all of 
them without bars and gates." This rising nationality will excite the envy 
of the rapacious conqueror. Moreover, there is reason to believe, from the 
allusion in v. 13, to "the merchants of Tarshish and all the young lions 
thereof," and from Isaiah xviii. that this outburst of Jewish prosperity is 
not altog^ether unconnected with British efforts to checkmate Russia in her 
designs upon India. By establishing a Jewish colony in Palestine, under 
British protectorate, the British government will succeed in maintaining 
communication with her Indian empire, through the Euphrates valley, and will 
thus be enabled to strengthen herseK against Russian aggression. Therefore, 
the motive of this northern Caesar, in his advance upon " the mountains of 
Israel, which have always been waste," is apparent. Impatient at the obstacle 
which prevents the consummation of his pet scheme of universal dominion — 
(the traditional aim of the Russian Czar — vide the will of Peter the Great) — 
he goes forth, " with great fury, to destroy and utterly to malie away many." 
— (Dan. xi. 44.) He comes "like a cloud to cover the land," all nations being 
at his steps. But his course is suddenly interrrupted. '\^Tiile his forces are 
encamped at Bozrah, in Edom, the Hon of the tribe of Judah breaks in upon 
them, and a gTcat carnage takes place. The event is described in Isaiah 
Ixiii. 3, 4, 6 :— 

" I will tread tliem in mine anger, and trample them in my fnry ; and their blood 
shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my raiment; for the day 
of vengeance is in my heart, and the year of my redeemed is come. 
I will tread down the people in mine anger, and make them drunk in my fury, and I 
vill bring down their strength to the earth." 

It would seem, however, that his army recovers this terrible disaster ; for it 
effects an advance into the country, and lays siege to Jerusalem. This is 
predicted in the following language : — 

" I will gather all nations against Jerusalem to battle, and the city shall be taken, 
and the houses rifled, and the women ravished." — Zech. xiv. 2. 

But at this stage, the manifestation of Christ and his saints takes place ; 
and a complete discomfiture of Gcg is the consequence : — 

" Then shall the Lord go forth and fight against those, nations, as when He fought in 
the day of battle; AND HIS FEET SHALL STAND IN THAT DAY UPON THE 
MOUNT OF OLIVES, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and the Blount of Olives 
shall cleave in the midst thereof." — verses 3, 4. 

Ezekiel describes what foUows (chap, xsxviii. 18-22) :— 






839 

" And it shall come to pass, at the same time . . that my fury shall come up in 
my face. For in my jealousy, and in the fire of my wrath, have I spoken, Surely in that 
day there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel; so that the fishes of the sea, 
and the fowls of heaven, and the beasts of the field, and all creeping things that 
creep upon the earth, and all the men that are upon the face of the earth, shall shake 
at imj PRESENCE ; and the mountains shall be thrown down, and the steep places 
shall fall, and every wall shall fall to the ground; and I will call for a sv/ord against 
him throughout all my mountains, saith the Lord God : every man's sword shall be 
against his brother. And I will plead against him with pestilence and blood, and I 
will rain upon him and upon his bands, and upon the many people that are with 
him, an overflowing rain, and great hailstones, fire, and brimstone." 

Zechariah adds to this — 

" This shall be the plague wherewith the Lord shall smite all the people that have 
fought against Jerusalem. Their flesh shall consume away while they stand upon 
their feet; their eyes shall consume away in their holes, and their tongue shall 
consume away in their mouth ; and it shall come to pass, that a great tumult from 
the Lord shall be among them; and they shall lay hold every one on the hand of 
his neighbour, and his hand shall rise up against the hand of his neighbour." — 
Zech. xiv. 12, 13. 

The result of the conflict is the destruction of five -sixths of the assembled 
armies. The remaining sixth escapes in flight (Ezekiel xxxix. 2), and carries 
the report of the supernatural defeat to the nations that " have not heard of 
His fame, nor seen His glory." — (Isaiah Ixvi. 19.) At this juncture, a 
manifesto, or imperial summons, will issue from Jerusalem, calling upon the 
nations to submit to the God-appointed king of all the earth. This is 
represented in Rev. xiv. 6, as an angel flying in the midst of heaven, having 
the everlasting Gospel (or glad tidings of the age), to preach unto them that 
dwell on the earth . . . saying, Fear God, and give glory to Him ; 
for the hon?' of His judgment is come." This summons is unheeded; "the 
beast of the earth and his armies assemble to make war with the Lamb," and 
them "who are with him," who are called the chosen and faithful, but 
the Lamb shall overcome them. How long he will allow them to oppose before 
he does so, is not revealed ; but he will not destroy them at once, as we have 
already seen. He will " grind them to powder" by a slow process, so as to 
develop the desired moral results. This will involve those judical visitations 
T/hich were treated of in the last lecture, which will have the effect of teaching 
the world righteousness. Afterwards will the following prediction be fulfilled :— 

" And I will set my glory among the heathen, and all the heathen shall see my 
judgment that I have executed, and my hand that I have laid upon them. So the 
house of Israel shall know that I am the Lord their God from that day aiul forward. 
And the heathen shall know that the house of Israel went into captivity f..r tlieir 
iniquity; because they tresrassed ngainst me, therefore hid I my face from thorn, 
and gave them into the hand of their enemies. . . . Now willl briii,!* 

again the captivity of Jacob and have mercy upon the whole house of IsvmcI ; 

neither will I hide my face any more from thorn, for I have poun-d out my 
spirit upon the house of Israel, saith the Lord God."— Ezck. xxxix. 21, 28, 20, 21). 



340 

Current events indicate the proximity of the criL^is. The Papacy is on its last 
legs. Felled from its position of supremacy, by the shock of the French 
Ke volution, over seventy years ago, it has been steadily declining since that 
time, and now stands deprived of its last prop by the defeat of the Austrian 
forces, in the Austro- Prussian war, and the incorporation of the greater part 
of the States of the Church by the young Idngdom of Italy. The Pope's 
temporal dominion is at an cud. French bayonets alone keep him in the 
*' chair of St. Peter." The revolution is crouching for a spring, only awaiting 
an opportunity. "His Holiness" has summoned around him the whole 
hierarchy of the Church to deliberate upon the position of affairs, and read a 
lesson to the powers of the earth on their duties and their sins, from a Roman 
Catholic point of view. Doubtless, the final scene is at the door. 

The attitude of Eussia points to an early probable attainment to the position 
assigned to her by the prophets in the time of the end. Her recovery from the 
disasters of the Crimean war is notorious to all the world, and her open 
alliance with Prussia and the United States, gives her a status in European 
politics, and a power to promote her military designs, which she never before 
possessed. Her territorial extension has never for a moment been suspended. 
During the last ten years, she has added large provinces in Central Asia, and 
conquered the great barrier that lay between her and Asia Mmor, in the 
Caucasus ; and politically by means of Servia and Greece, who are her vassals, 
she has penetrated to the heart of the Turkish empire. Her dark shadow is 
now looming ominously behind the Eastern question, which is once more 
tabled among European statesmen, through the occurrence of the Cretan 
Insurrection. The situation is ripening fast in favour of her coming supremacy. 
As to Turkey, as already said, she is rapidly falling to pieces. Roumania, 
Servia, and Egypt, formerly integral portions of the empire, have, within the 
last ten years, achieved something- like independence, acknowledging, through 
their rulers, only a nominal kind of suzerainty, which can be easily tlirown off 
at the first convenient moment. Crete has just closed a prolonged death- 
struggle with her Turkish oppressors for liberty. The Christian populations 
throughout the winkle of the dominions of the Sultan are in a seething ferment 
of rebellion, preparing to rise against him and throw off his yoke. The " sick 
man " is given up by the diplomatic doctors as incurable, and the papers are 
teeming with prognostications of the early downfall of the Turkish empire. 
In the scramble for the spoil, Russia will come in for the lion's share; Britain 
will, doubtless lay her hand on Egypt and Syria, to protect the highway to 
her Eastern possessions. This will be the time for the Jews to realise the 
partial restoration which takes place before the invasion of the land by Gog. 
The situation iy, day by day, becoming more favourable for this result. 



341 

Schemes for the colonization of the land are already in vogne among the Jews, 
and are received with increasing favour. Several societies exist to promote 
their return. They have sprung into existence within the last ten years, and 
have received a powerful impetus from the sentiment of nationality, which now 
prevails on the Continent, and regulates European politics — Italy for the 
Italians ; Palestine for the Jews ; these are political corollaries, and are on the 
eve of being placed side by side on the same basis of accomplished fact. The 
land of Palestine has come much under notice of late ; and as is well known, 
a society, with the Prince of Wales at its head, is now engag-ed in making a 
complete survey of the country. This helps to pave the way for the political 
Bequcl, in which Britain, mistress and protector of the Jews, not from any love 
of them, but from her own political exigencies having reference to India, will 
be the enemy of Prussia when she comes like a cloud to cover the land. 
England once in possession of the country, the restoration of the Jews mil be 
the development of a day. The Jews are ready, in great wealth, and with 
prompt disposition, to return to the land of their fathers, when the political 
obstacle presented l)y Turkey is finally removed. 

As to the state of the world generally, the temper of the nations is highly 
significant of the predicted crisis. The Scriptures inform us that in the epoch 
of the end, the world would become highly belligerent. This is intimated in 
such statements as the following : — 

"Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles; Prepare war, wake up the mighty men, 
let all the men of war draw near; lot them come up. Beat your ploughsliares into 
swords, and your pruning-hooks into spears ; let the weak say, I am strong." — Joel 
iii. 9-10. 

" Evil shall go forth from nation to nation, and a great whirlwind shall bo raised 
up from the coasts of the earth." — Jer. xxv. 32. 

"Upon the earth dislrcBS of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves 
roaring; men's hearts failing them for fear."— Luke xxi. 25, 2G. 

" The nations were angry, and Thy wrath is come."— Rev. xi. 18. 

Now it is notorious that the present state of the world is one of preparation 
for war. Never was there a time when there was such universal activity in the 
reorganization of armies, and such industry in the invention and manufacture uf 
wea-pons of war. Europe, in the language of a contemporary statesman, hns 
been turned into a large military camp. The war fever is universal. Peace 
is on the lips of rulers, but war in their hearts. The war cloud that thickens 
and spreads over all the sky will burst in terrible violence. A time of trouble, 
such as never was, is in store for the world. The worst experiences of anti- 
quity, when blood ran like water, and famine waited in the train of war, to 
kill its millions, will bo repeated on a scale of magnitude that will strike tho 



342 

-vrorld vdth. terror, and thin down its overstocked and corrupt population to a 
purified remnant. This is the divine purpose, and one with which all who are 
fired with zeal for divine service, have sympathy ; not that they delight in evil, 
per se, but that they have learnt that the stroke of judgment will alone break up 
the inextricable tangle of evil, in which human affairs are, in the i)resent 
state, involved ; that the storm of divine vengeance will alone relieve the 
atmosphere of the foetid and oppressive elements with which it is charged, and 
produce health to the nations by a healthy respiration of righteousness and 
peace ; that the relentless arm of righteous retribution — for " in righteousne.^s 
doth He judge and make war" — is alone adequate to deal that justice to the 
peoples which will clear away all encumbrances, and lay the foundation 
for that state of things, in which mankind, first being pure, will be peaceable, 
filled with goodwill and glory to God. When the kingdoms of this 
world shall have become the kingdoms of Jehovah and of His Christ, His 
glory shall cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. "When the smoke and 
carnage shall have passed away, the peaceful morning of righteousness and 
happiness will open with a smile upon the world. Jerusalem, which will have 
been the scene of crushing and angry judgments, will then become the centre 
of sweet influences. There will reign the king who shall " come down like 
rain upon the mown grass, like showers that water the earth." After the 
thunderstorm of judgment, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in 
his wings. Earth's troubles will be hushed in the calm -^f universal peace. 
There will be " glory to God in the highest heaven, over the earth peace and 
goodwill among men." 



342 



LECTUEE XII. 



TEE EEFUGE FMOM THE STORM; OR " WHAT MUST I DO TO 
BE SAVED?'' 

We have this afternoon to consider a subject which is unquestionably tha 
most important that can occupy our thoughts — a subject that overshadows 
every other in the magnitude of its concern as affecting ourselves individually. 
It is not like those general questions which meet us in daily life, relating to 
politics, social life, or individual position, which a man may attend to or let 
alone, according to his inclination or convenience: it is imperative and 
inexorable, demanding instant and unreserved attention from every human 
being, who in any degree recognises the veritude of that everlasting future 
which is fast hurrying upon our race. It is none other than the momentous 
and aU-absorbing enquiry — "What shall we do to be saved ? '* 

This is selected as the subject of the last lecture, because it follows the others 
in natural sequence ; it overtops and comes after all the topics that have been 
previously introduced. It is in fact the result produced by a serious con- 
sideration of these topics ; it is the great solicitation created in the mind by a 
contemplation of the truth of God as therein unfolded. If it be shown that we 
are mortal in constitution, and that immortality and the undefiled inheritance 
of the future ages are only conditionally attainable, what is the effect on every 
well-constituted mind but a strong anxiety to learn the nature of those 
conditions on which so much depends, and a sincere resolution to fulfil them 
when ascertained ? 

The present is an imperfect state of existence. Our natures are frail and 
corrupt ; society is improperly constituted (although no other constitution is 
practicable at present) : and the objects of pursuit presented to us by universal 
education, are miserably inadequate to satisfy the cravings of the mind. 
Finally, death is everywhere yawning at our feet, and will certainly some day 
engulph us in its pitchy abyss of darkness. What a miserable plight 



we are m 



God has made known Ilis purpose to revolutionize the W(.)rld, to establish a 
kingdom of His own, based on the highest princii)lcs, and to grant, at tliat time, 
to those who now conform to His revealed will, an incorruptible and immortal 
jiature, and a participation in the glory and honour of the divine constitution of 



344 

things which will bless the world with righteousness; in which relationship, 
such will enjoy the very perfection of being, and engage in occupations equal 
to their high capacities, and productive of the highest degree of enjoyment. 
"What a glorious future ! It is a future in which all have an invitation to 
pai-ticipate. "What a magnificent opportunity ! How can we let it slip ? How 
can we rest satisfied with oui present miserable lot ? How can we be content 
to labour for the mere wants of our animal nature, which will soon disappear 
in death ; or for the mere approval of a depraved public opinion which it is an 
honour to escape ; or for the mere accumulation of wealth, which we must 
leave to others, — when such a glorious destiny is shining upon us from the 
Bible ? It seems infatuation for rational beings to settle down into such a 
contentment. It is an infatuation, however, which is universally exhibited. 
The whole world is engaged in one grand process of " sowing to the flesh,'* 
which they deem to be the legitimate and " dutiful " occupation of life ; and 
the danger is, that we may be carried away by the whirl of popular sentiment 
as embodied in the "respectability " of the time, and diverted from that high 
spirit-revealed destiny which depends upon a whole-souled consecration to 
itself, in preference to the fashionable hobbies of " this present evil world." 

*' What must we do to be saved ? " What are the conditions which we 
are required to fulfil, in order to a participation in the great salvation to be 
revealed at the coming of the Lord ? Here is the momentous question specifi- 
cally proposed, demanding an equally specific answer. Let it be premised, 
then, that such a question pre- supposes a disposition on the part of the 
questioner, to gladly receive any conditions which the great Lawgiver may 
think fit to impose. It indicates a conviction that the boon to be bestowed is 
at the absolute disposal of the Giver. It is an admission that the petitioner 
has no natural claim upon it, and that the Bestower has the right to say upon 
what conditions it will be granted. In fact, when sincerely put, it shows the 
questioner to be in that childlike frame of mind which Jesus refers to when 
he says *' WTiosoever shaU not receive the kingdom of God as a little child, shall 
in no wise enter therein." — (Luke xviii. 17.) This is not the mental 
condition of moralists, who think that goodness of character entitles a 
man to future reward ; nor the condition of those who say that it is of no 
importance what a man believes, provided "his heart" be right; for such 
ignore the obligation of the conditions laid down, being filled wi.th "high 
thoughts " winch exalt themselves " against the knowledge of God." These 
" high thoughts" have their origin in the doctrine of the immortality of the 
soul. The effect of that doctrine is to cause the believer thereof to 
look upon every human beiag as the subject of positive eternal destiny; and 
as there are only two places and two classes related to that eternal destioy, 



I 



345 

viz., heaven and hell, and the inhabitants thereof respectively, he assigns every 
one of them, inf a.nts as well, to one or other of those places ; the one being a 
place of inexpressible bliss, and the other of unutterable woe. Now, as God 
is declared to be loving and merciful, it is supposed to be incompatible with 
His character that He should predicate entrance to the good place upon 
conditions which would have the effect of shutting out from it the great 
majority of mankind, or that he should in any case consign to the bad place 
those myriads of "good" people, who, though ignorant of the doctrinal 
teachings of the Bible, are not only harmless, but, in some cases, positively 
admirable in the characters they develop ; and hence the belief forces itself 
upon the mind, that general goodness and moral worth will be sure of 
acceptance, and that none will run such a narrow chance of getting in as those 
who pester their contemporaries with "bigoted" doctrine about the 
"narrowness" of the way. Some even go the length of believing that all 
itiankind will ultimately be saved. All this comes in logical consequence 
from the belief of the immortality of the soul, which disqualifies the subject 
of it from seeing these things in their proper light. Take away immortal- 
soulism, and what do we find ? We behold all manldnd perishing under a 
process of dissolution, from which they are unable to deliver themselves. 
" Death hath passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." — (Rom. v. 12.) 
It has constituted them a race of mortals, incapable, in the absence of some 
divine pre-a-rrangement, of elevating themselves (by any act of their own) 
above the condition in which they are involved. Hence, morality cannot save 
them. Virtue is simply the proper exercise of the faculties which pertain to 
them as moral and intellectual creatures, and does not, in any way, alter their 
relation to the future. What is popularly called "rightness of heart," is simply 
a softened state of the moral sentiments; and, though desirable to possess and 
admirable to behold, it will not save anyhody. Those who rely upon it will 
find that they are building upon a foundation of sand. How then is 
salvation possible ? And what relation have our efTorts to its attainment ? 
Jesus Christ was sent to answer these questions. He was sent for the 
purpose of opening a way of salvation ; and, having opened the way, he sent 
his apostles to tell mankind how it miyht be entered. 

It may be remarked, in passing, that the object in sending this message to 
the nations was not to convert them en masse, and bring about the niillonnium, 
as many erroneously suppose. Jehovah never proposed such a result from tlu^ 
preaching of the gospel. Had he done so, we should have found a difforc^nt 
state of things existing in this late period of the world's history. It is now uiovo 
than eighteen hundred years since the gospel was introduced to the world, jiiul 
instead of the world being converted through its influence, " the whole world 



S46 

lieth in wickedness," and knoweth very little about the gospel. Men will 
greedily run after any kind of foolishness that will tickle the fancy and 
pander to the fleshly mind ; but when the Gospel is " reasoned out of the 
Scriptures" for the commendation of their judgment, and the obedience of a 
thereby enlightened conscience, they pronounce the matter "dry," and turn 
listlessly away, as from a thing of no interest. Accepting Peter as a com- 
petent authority in the case, we find him reported by James to have said that 
the object which Jehovah had in view, in visiting the Gentiles, was ""to talie 
out of them a people for His name.'' — (Acts xv. 14.) This is all, then, that is 
proposed in the preaching of the Gospel — the gathering "out of every 
kindred, tongue, and nation," of all generations, a people who shall 
constitute that great manifested name in the earth, when " there shall be one 
Lord in all the earth, and His name (in which all who bear it will be included) 
One." The Gospel is, in fact, an invitation to all who accept it, to form part 
of that name, by putting it on in the appointed way ; but the class who 
obey the invitation is very small. Many are called, but few aee chosen." 
^'- Many shall strive to enter in^ and shall not he able" Jesus gave his 
commission to his disciples in the following words : — 

" Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. Ke that 
helieveth, and is baptized, shall be saved ; but he that believeth not shall be damned.^' — 
Mark xvi. 15, 16. 

Here we have a clear indication of the principle of which the " people for 
^His name " were to be selected. The Gospel was to be proclaimed, and those 
to whom it was proclaimed, were required to believe it. Nothing short of this 
would elect them to salvation ; for whosoever would not receive the kingdom 
of God as a little child should in nowise enter therein. The Gospel was thus 
constituted the agency of salvation ; hence, Paul styles it " the Gospel of your 
salvation'^ — (Ephesians i. 13). He also says, " The Gospel is the power of God 
wnto salvation to every one that believeth;" — (Rom. i. 16) and with 
increasing pointedness, declares, *'It pleased God, by the foolishness of 
PEEACHiNG, to savo them that believe.'' — (1 Cor. i. 21.) Hence if any man 
desires to be saved, the very first thing he has to do is to believe the GospeL 
Cornelius was instructed by an angel to " send men to Joppa, and call for 
Simon, whose surname is Peter, who shall tell thee the words WHEREBY 
thou and all thy house shall be saved." (Acts xi. 13, 14). And the Philippian 
jailor was told by Paul, in answer to his enquiry, "What shall I do to be saved?" 
— '^ Believe on the Lord Jesus Christy and thou shalt be saved, and thy house." — 
(c. xvi. 30, 31.) Beheving on the Lord Jesus, and believing the gospel, are 
exaetly the same thing ; for the gospel is made up of glad tidings concerning the 
Lord Jesus Christ ; and if a man believe the gospel, he believes on the Lord 



P 347 

Jesus Christ. If he is ignorant of the Gospel, he cannot believe on 
the Lord Jesus Christ, for "the Lord Jesus Christ" is not the mere 
name of the Saviour, as a personage, but a great doctrinal symbol, which 
can only be understood by those who are acquainted with the Gospel in 
its amplitude. The first thing a man has to do, then, in order to salvation, is 
to believe the Gospel ; but obviously, before he can believe it, he must know it, 
for as Paul says, " How shall they believe on him of whom they have not 
heard ? " — (Rom x, 14). Knowledge must always precede belief ; for a man 
cannot believ® that of which he has not previously been informed. Hence, 
the first enquiry on the part of man or woman anxious to be saved, should be, 
What is the Gospel ? For until they have arrived at a correct knowledge on 
this point, they cannot go on to the second stage of believing unto salvation. 
The Gospel is styled "the one faith," because it is made up of things which 
require faith to receive them^the act of the mind by which these are 
apprehended being metonymically put for the things themselves. It is laid 
down as a principle that " Without faith it is impossible to please Gob," 
(Heb. xi. 6,) and it is affirmed by Christians, " Ye are saved through faith,'' 
(Eph. ii. 8,) and " the just shall live by faith."— (Heb. x. 38.) Now this faith, 
in scriptural usage, is not a mere abstract reliance on the general omnipotence 
of Jehovah, but the belief of si3ecific promise. It is said that " faith was 
reckoned to Abraham for righteousness." — (Rom. iv. 9.) Now let us note tho 
character of this righteousness-acquiring faith : 

" He staggered not at the promise of God through unhelief, but was strong in faith, 
giving glory to God ; and being fully persuaded that what He had PROiiisED, He was 
able also to perform.^' — Rom. iv. 20, 21. 

Hence, it is said thsit faithful Abraham was constituted the fa the?' of aU 
them that believe, by which it is evident that scriptural faith is, bclirf in the 
promises of God ; and thus by a consideration of terms of a more general 
nature, we arrive at the conclusion to which we were guided in a former 
lecture by specific testimony, viz :— that the Gospel which must be believed in 
order to salvation, is made up of unfulfilled f>romises as its chirf element. 

What is the Gospel which is so composed ? As summarised by Luke, in Acts 
viii. 12, where he describes the preaching of Philip to the Samaritans, it is 
*'The things conceening the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus 
Christ." It thus appears to be a compound of two elements— the one relating 
to the kingdom of God, and the other to the doctrinal import of " the name " 
of Jesus, as affecting our individual salvation. Both of those must bo known ; 
and each must be understood before saving-faith is possible. Of the first, wo 
have already treated in Lectures VI and Vil, and indirectly, in Lectures VI (a), 
VIII, VIII (a), IX, and X. To these collectively, the reader is referred for an 



34S 

exposition of " the things concerning the kingdom of God;" and as for the 
things concerning "the Name," we are introduced^ to them in Acts iv. 12: 
*' There is none other na3<ee under heaven given among men, whereby we must 
be saved," — which is equivalent to saying, that there is only one name so givPUy 
and that is, the name of Jesus the Christ. This sentiment involves the 
doctrinal teaching set forth in Part 3 of Lecture V., concerning the death of 
Christ, and its relation to human redemption. Mankind are morally naked in 
the sight of Jehovah. They are destitute of native righteousness ; there is not 
one that doeth good and sinneth not. The goodness that they have is " filthy 
rags ' ' in comparison to the perfection of the angels. Now how shall they 
appear clothed in the sight of him who is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity? 
The answer is, that God has graciously provided a robe of rigliteousness^ which 
He freely invites all men to put on. That robe was prepared by the events 
recorded in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. It consists of the name of Jesvs 
Christ, who, by his obedience and truth, " is made unto us wisdom, and right- 
eousness, and sanctincation, and redemption." — (1 Cor. i. 30.) He has not 
only provided the robe, but he has instituted a means of investiture in the 
ordinance of baptism, which, according to the di\T.nely appointed formula 
introduces ''''into the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost." 
Says the Apostle, " As many of you as have teen haptized into Christ, have 
PUT ON Christ " — (Gal. iii. 27) ; and having put on Christ, they have put on 
the triple name, inasmuch as Jesus is a manifestation of the Father by means 
of the Holy Spirit, Those who are thus invested, have on " the wedding 
garment," (Matt. xxii. 12) — the fine Hnen, clean and white — which is the 
righteousness of saints. — (Rev. xix. 8.) They no longer ^^ walk naked; their 
shame appearing," (Rev. xvi. 15,) but are "found in him, not having their 
own righteousness which is of the law, hut the righteousness which is of God 
BY FAITH." We must, therefore, understand "the things concerning the 
kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ," before we can understand and 
believe the gospel which is the power of God unto salvation. The one without 
the other is of no efficacy. To be ignorant of " the things concerning the 
kingdom of God," is to be ignorant of the gospel. A man may be well ac- 
quainted with the historical facts of Christ's crucifixion, resurrection, and 
ascension ; but unless he understands them in their true doctrinal significance, 
and in their connection with " the glory that shall follow,'' his knowledge of 
them is of no avail for salvation, and conveys to him no enlightenment as to 
God's purposes. This is peculiarly the case where the knowledge in question 
is associated with the doctrine of the immortality of the soul ; for it then ceases 
to have any scriptural significance or efficacy whatever, because of the pervert- 
ing influence of that dogma. Christ died to purchase life, " He brought life 



I 



349 

and immortality to liglit," by the sacrifice which he submitted to. By tha 
grace of God, he tasted death for every man, (Ileb. ii. 9,) but if we regard 
immortality as the essential attribute of human nature, we displace the 
sacrifice of Christ from its scriptural position. We destroy its character as a 
means of securing life^ and are compelled to transform it into that barbarous 
doctrine of orthodoxy, which regards it as substitutionary suffering of divine 
wrath, in order to save immortal souls from the eternal tortures of hell I — a 
suffering, which, after all, according to orthodox teaching, was awfully 
inadequate ; for countless myriads of immortal souls, according to that system 
of teaching, still continue unreconciled, and are fated to spend an eternity of 
existence hi raging, blaspheming torture ! The doctrine of the immortality 
of the soul, then, must be removed from the mind before Christian truth can 
obtain a proper entrance ; for it nullifies the whole system, by obliterating- its 
foundation doctrine, that ''by one man came death T^ and destroys its 
efficacy by entirely diverting attention from the salvation which it offers, and 
directing it to a reward which God has never promised. In fact, its effect is 
to pervert, vitiate, poison, nullify, and destroy everything pertaining to God's 
truth. It sends its jarring^ vibrations through the entire system of revelation, 
introducing confusion and absurdity where otherwise reign peace, order, 
harmony, beauty, and consistency. Theologically, it is an unclean spirit of 
which a man naust be exorcised, before he can become clothed and in his right 
mind in rela^tion to divine truth. Previously to this, his mind is filled -with 
truth-neutralising doctrine, which efTectually prevents the entrance of a single 
ray of the truth. 

The point at which we have arrived, is, that one of the fundamental 
conditions of salvation, is belief of certain definite matters of teaching contained 
in the gospel, styled " the things concerning the Kingdom of Go|i, and the 
name of Jesus Christ.'' Those "things" involve the whole circle of di\-ino 
truth. They embrace the knowledge of the Creator himself ; our relation 
to Him a^ sinful, worthless creatures ; the teaching concerning Jesus Christ ; 
Jehovah's dealings with our race, Ilis promises, the means which He has 
provided for salvation, our duties towards Him, &;c. What more fitting than 
that such a knowledge, and such a faith, should be required as a condition of 
fitness for an eternal existence of service based thereupon ? It is only the 
merest ignorance that opposes "creed" as a means of present improvement, 
and future salvation. IIow can the moral nature be developed without 
appropriate stimulus 'r^ If a man has nothing definite to hope for, how can 
his hope bo active ? If he has no particular object of f;iith presented to 
him, how can his faith be exercised ? The very beauty of doctrinal Christian- 
ity is, that it supplies to the mind just exactly what is needed to draw out and 



350 

satisfy its higher instincts ; and what if belief be required for salvation ? 
Is there no beauty here ? Suppose a generation of untutored men who had never 
heard of the gospel — whose minds had never been exercised in hope of the prom- 
ised salvation; whose affections had never been drawn out towards God, and the 
Lord Jesus Christ, and the saints past and present ; whose natures had never been 
chastened into submission to divine will; but who, nevertheless, were respectable 
enough, as the phrase goes — suppose such were admitted into the kingdom of 
God, at the coming of Christ, what happiness could result to them, or glory to God ? 
The answer is, that none would be possible. They would be thoroughly inappre- 
ciative. They would failto experiencethe gratitude which years of definite expec- 
tation will create in the bosom of the saints, and be equally incapable of giving 
that glory to God which wHl burst with spontaneous outflow from the mouths 
and hearts of those who have been ''looking for that blessed hope.'* The 
residt would be a failure, divinely and humanly considered. God ptirposes a 
higher consummation than this : He is making ready " a chosen gtneratxon^ 
a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people, to show forth the praises 
of Him who hath called them out of dark?iess into His marvellous light. — (I 
Peter ii. 9.) And this people He is preparing on the j)rinciple of ^* putting on 
the new man, which is renewed in KyowT.TTDGE after the image of Him that 
created hiniy'' — (Col. iii. 10,) ^'filling them with the exowlzdge of his wnx, 
in all wisdom and spiritual understand hi g:' — ^Col. i. 9.) The means by 
v.'hich He is accomplishing this work is the preachine of the gospel, and though 
the "enlightened" may sneer at ''creed" and " points of doctrine," and the 
'' charitable '" may enlarge the breadth of their deceitful Hberality. even to the 
obhteration of every distinctive feature from the system to which they profess 
cttachment, no one whose mind is enlightened in the Word will be misled by 
their cavillings. " The wisdom of this world is foolishness ivith God/* No- 
thing will serve a man in the end. but an exact knowledge of the will of Gx>d 
as contained in the Scriptures, and faithful carrying out of the same to rigid- 
ness. The wise may protest against the "dogmatism" and "bigotry'* 
involved in such a course, but the enlightened conscience will approve. " Our 
faith standeth not in the wisdom of men, but in the word of God." Jesus has 
said (and let every man give ear I) " The words that I speak unto you, Thzt 
are spirit, and they are life.'' — (John vi. 63.) That is, the gospel which he 
approved was "the power of God unto salvation," and, therefore, ^the wards 
of eternal life,*" as they are designated by Peter. — (John vi. 68.) And saith 
the Lord Jesus — 

"He that rejecteth me, and rfcftrgffc not m^ xcords, hath one that judgeth him: 
THE WORD THAT I HAVE SPOKEN, the same shilljuigi him in the last day.' — John xii. 43. 

Here, then, is the standard by which our position will be measured when the 



351 

great testing time arrives ; and whether judged " uncharitable " or not, it is 
better to walk in "the narrow way" of the Word's exact teaching, with 
little company, than to be found in the "broad road " of either vague specu- 
lation or popular heresies, which the great multitude perambulate. The 
former leadeth unto life ; the other leadeth to certain destruction. 

" If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, 
and follow me ; for whosoever shall save his life shall lose it; but whosoever shall 
lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it. For what is a man advantaged if he 
gain the whole world, and lose himself, or be east away ? For whosoever shall be 
ashamed of me and of my woeds, of him shall the Son of Man be asliamed wlien he 
shall come in his own glory,^' — Luke ix. 23-26. 

" If any man among you seemeth to be wise in this world, let him become a fool, 
thai he may he wise ; for the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God." — 1 Cor. 
iii. 18, 19. 

But all this is in direct opposition to modem religious sentiment. Between 
secular influence and religious impotency, there is growing up in society, on a 
very extensive scale, especially in the northern counties of England, a total 
disbelief in the necessity of doctrinal enlightenment as an element of accepta- 
ble character before God. It is becoming fashionable in all grades of refined 
society, to sneer at "creed" as a relic of bygone days of superstition, and to 
regard its advocacy as a sign of narrow-mindedness and intellectual stunt. 
The all-in-all of " true religion " in these modern days, is fast resolving itself 
into abstract sincerity, goodness of character, piety of sentiment, &c. ; belief 
in " doctrinal points " is at a discount. Only let a man be sincere in goodness 
of intention, and live a moral and exemplary life, and be he ever so ignorant 
or mistaken as to the cardinal points of religious truth, he is sure of a goodly 
share in any inheritance that may be in store for the deserving ; this is popu- 
lar sentiment. Now it is either true or false — safe or delusive. If it is true 
and safe, then the Scriptures are of no authority. It really comes to this. 
No man can consistently profess a belief in the divine authority of the Bible, 
and hold this loose sentiment on such a momentously important subject; 
because the Bible uniformly and distinctly narrows down the chance of 
salvation to a certain arbitrary "narrow way" which few find, or caro to 
walk in when found. Definite conditions are stated, and compliance recpiircd, 
involving something more than general goodness of moral nature ; and aU 
who are intentionally or circumstantially on the side of non-compliance, aro 
excluded from the blessing. The issue is, therefore, direct between the Biblo 
and unbelief. We are on one side or the other in reference to this question ; 
there is no neutral ground. If we have any expectation of future perfection 
at all, it is because of promises contained in the Bible ; for we can draw no 
reason from any other source to warrant such an oxpcctuUou. If, tlicn, wo 



352 

desire, or even dimly conceive it possible to realise this perfection, it can 
only be on the ground of a full compliance with the "whole of the 
conditions upon which it is predicated ; for what other ground of 
coniidence have we ? If, on the other hand, we discard the Bible altogether 
fi-om the account as a book of questionable authority, we are then without 
hope of any kind. There is no middle position. If a man hope to attain to 
the salvation of the Bible, he must comply with the Bible's own terms. It is 
not at his command on any terms he pleases. It is not purchasable by the 
shabby virtue of human character. It is special in relation to human life ; 
and the means of attainment are, therefore, special. If you are not pleased 
with the speciality — " the contractedness of the affair" — you are at liberty to 
let it alone ; you will not be compelled to take a part in a thing so distasteful 
to you ; you will be allowed to make the most you can out of your ephemeral 
mortality, with all its petty concerns, which you hug with so much desire. 
Only remember that you will have nothing to hope for in the future, and that 
you may have something to answer for, in contemptuously refusing the 
proffered conditional goodness of Grod. You may begin to talk about justice 
requiring the recogiiition and reward of your virtue in a future life. Do you 
know whereof you ainrm ? On what principle do you make out your claim ? 
Tou have uniformly refrained from crime ; you have made it a practice to 
restore lost property to its owner ; to bestow charity upon the poor ; to show 
kindness to your eq"::LLls. Very g-ood ; but have you thereby estabhshed a 
title to another life ? A claim upon reward ? l^ay, my friend, philosopher 
as thou art, thou oughtest to know that such a course of virtue is, in its 
bearing, restricted to the life that thou liast. Thou thereby givest action to 
the noble quail lies that distinguish thee from the brutes, and dost the more 
nearly approach the happiness of which thy nature is capable ; but thou dost 
not necessarily secure a right to that other life, which is something special iu 
relation to thy poor mortal existence, growing not out of it in natural course, 
but (to be conditionally) superadded to it by the creative power of God. It 
is in vain for thee thus to hope for it as a reward of thy natural virtue. It 
is deposited in Christ Jesus for thy benefit; if thou wUt accept him, thou shalt 
have life (1 John v. 10, 12) ; otherwise, thy poor virtue will profit thee 
nothing, but will vanish with thyself from the creation of God. 

That there should be so much philosophical hostility to 1)6116/, is matter for 
surprise. Belief is no invention of creed makers ; it is the natural, constant, 
essential act of finite minds. We cannot mentally exist without it. If we 
don't believe in religious creeds, we believe in something. We cannot help 
believing. It is the main-spring of aU intelligent action— the source of 
happiness and woe. What makes a man toil all day in the factory ? Because 



853 

he believes lie will get liis wages ; would lie do so if lie did not ? "Why is the 
condemned criminal so overwhelmed and dejected ? Because he believes his 
death will take place on an early day ; but let him be told that a reijrieve has 
arrived; and he ilies into ecstacies of joy. Why? Because he believes he 
shall escape the doom that was impending over him. Our whole commercial 
system is based on belief ; and the moment society begins to be distrustful, 
that is, unbelieving^ then we have a panic, and all the e\d.ls that come in ita 
train. So in matters religious : belief is the first principle, the foundation of 
practical faith, the source of spiritual ecstacy, the cause of consistent action. 
Now, what is belief? It is the assent of the mind to definite points of 
information. Obviously, then, before belief can take place, the mind must be 
informed; that is, it must first know or be aware of the subject of behef. 
Hence, knowledge (though only in the limited sense of information) is the 
foundation of belief. This principle is practically admitted in things 
secular ; how inconsistent, then, to deny its importance in things religious. 
How foolish to talk down "doctrinal points" as of no moment. Those 
*' points," so much disparaged by the wise men of this generation, are, in 
reality, so many items of information on which our belief concerning the 
futui-e is founded, and to run them down as undeserving of an intelligent 
man's attention, is to insult his judgment, and, in reality, betray religious 
unbelief. If they are untrue, then they are something more than trivial, and 
deserve to be scouted ; but if they are true, it is folly of a type bordering on 
insanity to treat them with indifference. The issue, therefore, lies between 
belief and unbelief— not between "bigotry" and "charity." Those who 
profess the latter issue, raise a false cry, and divert many souls from the truth. 
Nothing in this age is so dangerous to a man's spiritual interest as the spirit 
of religious "liberality " that is abroad. It is a liberality that lulls many a 
soul into deceitful slumber, blinding their eyes to the "narrow way" which 
leadeth unto life. In the broader road, in the most respectable company, 
with the delights of highly cultivated intcUect, and aU the sweets of 
luxurious refinement, and hurried forward by the breeze of popular 
reputation, they are clutching after many shadows, and rushing on to certain 
destruction. God grant that some in the reading of these pages, may bo 
enticed from the worldly throng, and induced to cast in thoir lot witli a 
humbler people, who, in the spirit of profoundest regard for the word of the 
living God, are seeking to do His will according to His revealed ro(iuiromonts. 
Belief of the Gospel is the first condition of salvation. Tliis, ]iowe\er, is not 
all. A man may believe in all the glorious promises of God, and yet not be a 
participator in them. How shall he establish an individual title to tlinn ? Tliis 
is his next consideration. The (lucstiun has been anticipated in tlic cUvino 



354 

arrangement. A ceremony has been instituted by which he may pass represent- 
atively into Christ, and thereby establish a claim to all the blessings which have 
been covenanted to him — as a woman betrothing herself to her future husband 
becomes prospective inheritor of what belongs to him. That ceremony is 
baptism. " He that believeth, and is baptised, shall be saved." 

This is a feature of the Christian system which is pretty generally ignored 
by the great body of those who claim the Christian name in the present day. 
They do not recognize the oblig'ation, and do not practise the duty of being 
baptized ; but explain it away, or sturdily oppose it. How extraordinary 
that a loud profession of Christian allegiance should be allied to systematic 
violation of one of the plainest of Christian precepts ! It cannot be said that 
there is any ambiguity in the manner in which the duty is set forth in the 
Kew Testament; for we find that Christ's general announcement on the 
fiubject is copiously illustrated both by exigetical comment and recorded 
example. On the day of Pentecost, for instance, when the striken-in-heart 
exclaimed, " Men and brethren, what shall we do ? " the answer was, "Repent 
and be baptised, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ," and the 
narrative gives the following as the result of this exhortation : — " Then they 
that gladly received his ii'ord weee baptised ; and the same day there were 
added unto them about 3,000 souls." — (Acts ii. 37, 38, 41.) Here is both 
precept and example : but we are not left with testimony so meagre. We 
are told in Acts viii. 12, that ^'•when the Samaritans believed Philip preaching 
the things concerning the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they 
WEEE BAPTISED BOTH MEN AND WOMEN." Again, in the casc of Cornelius and 
his companions, we read in Acts x. 47, 48, that at the close of their interview 
Tvith Peter, that apostle said, " Can any man forbid water that these should 
not be baptized, who have received the Holy Ghost as well as we ? And he 
commanded them to be baptized in the name of the Lord."" Again, in the case 
of Paul himself, we find the same course adopted after his conversion. 
"And now, why tarriest thou ?" said Ananias to him, (Actsxxii. 16 ;) '"''arise 
and be bajjtised, and wash away tliy sins, calling upon the name of the Lord." 
"And he arose and was baptized." — (Acts ix. 18.) Then we have the 
case of the Philippian jailor, recorded in Acts xvi., in which the same lesson 
is enforced by the powerful argument of example. It is stated in v. 33, 
" He was baptized, he and all his, straitway. Then we have to remember that 
even the Lord Jesus himself submitted to this act of obedience. We read — 

"Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jord-an, unto John, tohe baptised of him; but 
John forbade him, saying, I have need to be baptised of thee, and comest thou to 
me? And Jesus answering, said unto him, Suffer it to be so now, for thus it 
becometh us to fulfil all righteousness. Then he sujj'ered him.'' — Matt. iii. 13-15. 



3o5 

Thus New Testament examples are very numerous and decisive as to the 

meaning of Christ's words. They show that baptism in water was a rite 

attended to by all who believed the truth in early time ; and one would argue 

that what was necessary or appropriate in the first Christians, is just as 

necessary and appropriate (and more so, if there be any difference) in Christians 

of the nineteenth century. It is by no means fashionable, however, to take 

this view. The generality of professing Christians argue against the necessity 

of baptism in their case, and prefer to risk neglect on their own responsibility. 

It is clear, however, that the apostles looked upon the act in a much more 

serious light. Paul, in the words already quoted, is very expressive on the 

subject : — 

" As many of you as have been baptized into Christ, have put on Christ."— 
Gal. iii. 27. 

Again, — 

♦• Ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the 
body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ ; buried with him in 
BAPTISM, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of 
God."— Col. ii. 11, 12. 

Again, Paul says, in Rom. vi. 3-6 — 

"Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ, were 
baptized into Ms death ? Therefore, w" are buried with him by baptism into 
death ; that like as Christ was raised up from tlie dead by the glory of the Father, 
even so we also should walk in newness of life ; for if we have been planted together 
in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection. 
Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might bo 
destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin." 

Finally, Peter makes the following allusion to it, wliich, though incidental, 
is unmistakable : — 

"In the days of Noah while the ark was preparing, wherein few, that is. eight 
souls, were saved by (or as the marginal reading gives it, 'throuyhl water. The 
like figure whereunto BAPTISM DOTH ALSO NOW SAVE US (not the putting 
away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God) by 
the resurrection of Jesus Christ." — 1 Peter iii. 20, 21. 

There are other similar references to baptism througliout the epistles ; but 
these are sufficient to show that whatever may be the difficulty of modom 
professing Christians in discovering any significance or efficacy in t\w urdnKince 
of baptism, the apostles saw much of both. Thoy rocogiii/cd in it a 
constitutional transition from one relationship to another, — a roprcsontativo 
putting-off of the old man, or Adam nature, and a putting on of llio 
new man, or Christ, who is the one covErviNO namk, in which, when 
the naked son of Adam is invested, ho stands clothed before Jciiovah, 
and is approved in His sight. Of course this elhct is imputative ; 



356 

that IS to say, it is not brought about by the mere act of sub- 
mersion in water, which in itself has no religious virtue whatever, 
but is the result recognized hy God when the act is performed in connection 
with an intelligent apprehension and affectionate belief of the truth. 
It may seem strange and incredible that God would connect such a momentous 
change with a trivial and (as some regard it) ridiculous observance. An 
earnest mind, however, will not stop to reason on the matter when once 
satisfied that it is the wiU of God, especially when he remembers that it is one 
of the characteristics of God's dealings with men that He selects, "weak 
things, things despised, yea, and things that are not " (1 Cor. i. 27, 28), by 
which to accomplish important results, that it may be seen that the power is 
of God, and not in the means, and that true obedience may be secured in His 
servants. It was not the eating of the apple in itself— SLipart from the divine 
prohibition — that constituted Adam's offence. It was not the mere looking at 
the brazen serpent in the wilderness that cured the serpent-bitten Israelites. 
It was not ISJ'aaman's sevenfold immersion in Jordan in itseK that cured him of 
his leprosy. It was the principle involved in each case that developed the 
results, viz., the principle of obedience to the divine law, which is one 
prominent feature in all God's dealings with man. Obedience is the great 
thing required at our hands. 

" Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in oheying the 
voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat 
of lambs." — 1 Sam. xv. 22. 

It matters not what the act may be ; the more unlikely the thing required, 
the more severe the test, and the more conspicuous the obedience, even if it be 
the offering up of an only son, or the slaughtering of a whole nation. In any 
case, and at all hazards, obedience must be yielded. God is not less exacting in 
this respect under the Christian dipensation, than He was under the law ; but, 
if possible, more so ; for Paul makes the following remark in Heb. '*. 1, 3. — 

" Therefore, we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things \Thich we 
(Christians) have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip. For if the word 
spol-en by angels (viz., the law which was given through the disposition of angels. — 
Acts vii. 53) was stedfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just 
recompense of reward, how shaxl we escape if we neglect so great salvation, which 
' at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard 
Him i " 

So that although Christianity may be said, in its prescriptions, to be ''a yoke 
that is easy and a burden that is Hght," yet, in respect of its obligation^ we 
are taught by the Apostle that it exceeds the law in rigidness and responsibility. 
How perilous, then, to tinker with it after the fashion of modern " charity," 
saying that it is of no importance whether we believe its doctrines or not, and 



357 

of no concern whether we attend to its ordinances ! What an awful 
responsibility do they take upon themselves who are guilty of this presumption! 
God requires the one hope, the one faith, and one baptism, as the only 
acceptable offering which a poor son of Adam can present under the Christian 
dispensation ; and to offer Him instead, a mere sentimental piety of our own 
devising, is to offer " strange fire," which assuredly will bring death upon the 
off'erer. God has required all believers of His truth to be immersed, as a 
means of transferring them from the dominion of the old mortal Adam, to a 
life-giving connection with the second Adam, the Lord from heaven, who is 
made a quickening spirit ; and though it may be very humiliating to submit 
to an act in which the eye of sense can perceive no reason, yet in that very 
submission, obedience is more thoroughly tested, and more God-honouringly 
exemplified than in the performance of that which necessity or a natural sense 
of fitness would dictate. The change wrought in our position by baptism is 
" throiigh the faith o/the opeeation of God." — (Col. ii. 12.) If there be no such 
faith, of course there is no ef&cacy in the act ; so that the view we take of 
baptism really depends on our condition of mind in relation to God. Child-like 
faith in His word and implicit submission to His will (without which it is 
impossible to please Him), will at once lead us to regard it as an essential act, 
under the Christian dispensation, on the part of every one desiring to attain 
to the great salvation ; for had it been unessential, it would never have been en- 
joined as a Christian institution, and never attended to by the Lord Jesus, the 
apostles, and the early Christians. Yet the character of the act depends upon 
the condition of the person attending to it ; for as has been already observed, 
in itself iti^ TLOihing An unenlightened person is not a fit subject for its 
observance, however sincere he may be in his desire to do the will of God. 
It is only prescribed for those who believe the Gospel ; and in early times it 
never was administered to any other. Men were never exhorted to be baptized 
until they had arrived at a knowledge of "the word of salvation." For 
without such knowledge, the act would have been a mere bodily ablution, as 
profitless, in relation to eternal life, as those performed under the law. In 
evert/ New Testament instance^ the Gospel was understood and hel'uvcd hcfore 
baptism was administered. It requires the " one faith " to constitute tlie "one 
baptism." Is was only a '^ washing of water BY THE WORD."— (Eph. v. 
26.) But when the word was absent from the mind, the cleansing element was 
awanting, and the subject of the rite was still unwashed — still eh)thed in filthy 
garments — still without the wedding garment in the sight of God Tliis is tho 
condition of vast multitudes in our own day, who have been innnersod as a 
rcHgious ordinance, but who were in total ignorance of the Gosi^I proacliod by 
Jesus and his apostles, at the time they submitted to it. Their ininicrt^ion, under 



358 

such circumstances is utterly worthless, if repeated a thousand times ; and if 
ever they come to a true knowledge of the word, baptism will just be as necessary 
as if they had never gone into the water at all. * As for those who give countenance 
to the sprinkling of babies as Christian baptism, the whole tendency of the 
foregoing arg-ument is to show that they are guilty of religious foolishness, of 
a tyi^e so palpable and self-eTident, as to require no formal refutation ; and 
their case must be dismissed with the remark that the doctrine of infant baptis- 
mal regeneration, like all the other absurdities of the apostasy, is indebted for 
its existence and support, to the one great central delusion which is the very 
life of orthodoxy — the doctrine of the immortality of the soul. 

To sum up the whole matter, a person instructed in " the word of the 
kingdom," enquiring what must he do to be saved, has only one scriptural 
answer to receive : '"'' Repent and be haptised into the name of Jesus Christy for 
the remission of sins.'' — (Acts ii. 38.) When he has yielded this " obedience of 
faith," he is "bom of water" through the inceptive influence of the truth; 
and having entered "The Name," his sins are ^^ covered-/' his transgres- 
sions " hid ; " his whole past life is cancelled, and he has commenced a term 
of probation in which he is a lawful candidate for that " birth of the spirit " 
from the grave, which will finally constitute him a " son of God, being of the 
children of the resurrection," (Luke xx. 36,) "waiting for the adoption, to 
Tvit, the redemption of the body." — (Rom. viii. 23.) But his ultimate accept- 
ance will depend upon the character he develops in this new relation If he 
bring forth the fruits of the spirit, viz., moral results proceeding from the 
spirit- words (John vi. 63), which have obtained a lodgment in his mind, as 
the motive-power, he will be approved by the Lord when he returns " to take 
account of his servants," as of those who " bring forth fruit, some thirty, and 
some sixty, and some a hundredfold." But if he continue to perform "the 
works of the flesh," or actions, whether "respectable" or otherwise, which 
are dictated by the mere fleshly instincts, apart from the enlightenment of the 
Word, of which his mind has been the subject — he will be adjudged of those 
*' who, when they have heard, go forth, and are choked with cares, and riches, 
and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to perfection." "He that sow- 
ETH TO HIS fi.t:sb.j shall of the flesh reap corrnj^tion ; but he that soweth 
TO THE SPIEIT, shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting.''' — (Gal. vi. 8.) The 
two classes are differently dealt with by the Father. " Every branch in me," 
says Jesus, " that beareth not fruit. He talieth away ; and every branch that 
beareth fruit, He purgeth it, that it may bring forth more fruit.'* The names 

* For a scriptural case of re-immersion, see Acts xix. 1-5, where twelve disciples, 
who had been baptized by John the baptist, were re-immersed on having their faitU 
rectified on a certain point by Paul. 



35b 

of the tormer are " blotted out of the LamVs book of life" (Rev. iii. 5), in 
which they had been inscribed at their immersion ; while the other became the 
special objects of divine training, by means of the circumstances around them, 
providentially arranged— " all things working together for good, to them who 
are the called according to His purpose,'' — (Rom. viii. 28.) 

"Teach them to observe all things whatsoever I have com^ia^ded." 

(Matt, xxviii. 20.) This was Christ's parting instruction to his Apostles. On 
another occasion, he said " Ye are my friends, if ye do wb:atsobybr I cmnmand 
you:'— {John xv. 14.) Now there is a certain ordinance of which he has said 
"this do in eemembeance of me" (Lukexxii. 19) ; and this being one of 
"allthings whatsoever he has commanded," it is demanded as a sign of our 
friendship, that we attend to it. The reference is to the " breaking of bread," 
or " the Lord's supper," in which we are informed the first Christians "con- 
tinued stedfastly."— (Acts ii. 12.) It was originally instituted when Christ 
and his disciples were met together for the last time to observe the Jewish 
passover. "We read that on the occasion — 

"He (Jesus) took bread, and gave thanks, and brake it, and gave unto them, say- 
ing, This is my body which is given for you : this do in remembrance of me. Likewise 
also the cup after supper, saying, This cup is the New Testament in my blood, which 
is shed for you." — Luke xxii. 19, 20. 

Here is an emblematic breaking of bread instituted by Christ for the 
observance of his disciples during his absence. It was to be attended to 
*Hn remembrance of him," till he should return again, as is evident from Paul's 
remark in 1 Cor. xi. 26, "As often as ye eat this bread and drink this cup, ye 
do show the Lord's death till he come." The observance is a very appro- 
priate one. The bread, according to the Master's direction, represents his 
broken body, and the wine his shed blood ; and thus is the scene which human 
nature is most liable to forget— the exhibition of Christ's personal love and 
the condemnation of sin in the flesh— memorialised before the disciples partak- 
ing of those symbols. The observance furnishes a common centre around 
which the brethren of Christ may rally in that capacity, and be spiritually 
refreshed by the contemplation of the great sacrifice to which he lovingly 
submitted on their account, while it affords a tangible mode of expressing 
their love for him who, though absent, has promised to come again. Though 
simple in its nature, it is profoundly adapted to their spiritual exigencies, 
necessitating assembly which might rarely take place, and calling forth exhort- 
ation and counsel, which might never be uttered ; thus creating circumstances 
pre-eminently conducive to their building up in the glorious faith and hope 
which they possess, and counteracting the secularising and spiritually-corroa- 
ive effect of the business life which they have to live in the world. Having 



360 

been commanded, its observance is a binding duty wbicli no really enligbtened 
Christian wiU underrate in importance, or seek to evade. The Quaker runs 
to one extreme in the mattei^, discarding the use of all Christian institutions 
whatever ; and the Roman Catholic runs to the other — exalting them into de 
facto vehicles of spiritual essence. But those who are intelligent in the Word 
will be preserved from both. 

As to the time at which the ordinance is to be attended to, or the frequency 
with which it must be waited upon, there is no command ; but the practice of 
the first Christians may be taken as a certain guide, considering that they were 
under the immediate supervision of the apostles. We read in Acts xx. 7, 
*' Upon the first day of the week^ when the disciples came together to break 
BREAD, Paul preached imto them ; " and again in 1 Cor. xvi. 2, " U2)on tlie 
first day of the week^ let every one of you lay by him in store as God hath 
prospered him." The first day of the week was the Jewish Monday, and 
therefore our Sunday. It was the day upon which Christ rose from the dead, 
and, therefore, an appropriate occasion for the celebration of an event of which 
his resurrection was the glorious consummation. 

It will be noted that there is no warrant in the facts and testimonies produced 
on this subject, for the stringent doctrine on the Sabbath as enforced in 
Christendom of the present day. The Sabbath was a Jewish institution. It 
was part of the yoke "which," says Peter, " neither we nor our fathers were 
able to bear." It was no part of the Christian system. It was abolished with 
" the handwriting of ordinances that was against us ; " and the fact of its 
incorporation wiXh Christianity may be best explained by the fact, that in the 
days of the apostles, there were some who rose up and said "Ye must be 
circumcised, and heep the lam of Moses^' and systematically taught the doctrine 
expressed in the saying. But this doctrine was not a true one then, any more 
than it is now ; for at a council of the apostles which was held to consider the 
matter, the following letter was adopted : — 

" The apostles, and elders, and brethren send greeting unto the brethren which 
are of the Gentiles in Antioch, and Syria, and Cilicia. Forasmuch as we have heard 
that certain which went out from us have troubled you with words, subverting your 
Bouls, saying, Ye must be circumcised, and keep the laio, TO WHOM ^\^ GAVE NO 
SUCH COMMANDMENT ; it seemed good unto us, being assembled with one accord, 
to send chosen men unto you . . to tell you the same things by mouth. For it 
Beemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us, to lay upon you no greater burden than 
these necessary things : that ye abstain from meats offered to idols, and from blood, 
and from things strangled, and from fornication ; from which if ye keep yourselves, 
ye shall do well."— Acts xv. 23, 29. 

Thus the apostles distinctly prohibited the imposition of any of the Mosaic 
enactments, except such as they specifically mention, upon the practice of the 



361 

Christians of the olden times, and, therefore, the Sabbath amongst the rest, for 
if it had been an exception, it would have been mentioned among tJie exceptions. 
But this authoritative prohibition did not extinguish the Judaising spirit which 
had crept in. Hence, we find Paul writing in the following strain to the 

Galatians : — 

" Ye observe DAYS, and months, and times, and years. I am afraid of you, lest X 
have bestowed upon you labour in vain." — chap. iv. 10, 11. 

Again, " Let no man, therefore, judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an 
holyday, or of the new mooE, or of the Sabbath." — Col. ii. 13. 

His teaching on the subject of the Sabbath is, '' One man esteemeth one day- 
above another ; another esteemeth every day alike. Let every man he fully 
persuaded in his own mind,''— {Roth. ySy. 5); as much as to say, it is a matter 
of so little importance, that every one must be regulated by private conviction. 
Popular views on this subject, then, as illustrated in pulpit inculcation, are 
obviously mistaken. It is the privilege of the Christian to rest from labour on 
the first day of the week, and to engage more specially in spiiitual meditation 
than he can do on a week day ; but he is under no bondage. He is free to 
engage himself as expediency may determine, without the risk of infiinging 
any law of God. Whatever is right to be done by him on a week-day, is not 
wrong to be done on Sunday, although it may not be expedient. Yet he does 
not advocate the abolition of Sunday as a day of rest from secular 
laboui', and attendance upon religion. He is only too thankful for the 
opportunity it confers upon him. He only protests against an error which 
binds a grievous burden on the backs of those who are its subjects, remembering 
that his Master has said " It is lawful to do well on the Sabbath day," oven if 
that well doing be the pulling of ears of corn in the field to gratify hunger, or 
the rescue of an unfortunate sheep which may have fallen into the pit on the 
Sabbath day. 

In conclusion, the answer to the question-title of this lecture is very briefly 
summarised. Let a man become doctrinally acquainted with tlie truth 
expressed in the New Testament phrase, " the things concerning the kingdom 
3f God and the name of Jesus Christ ; " let him then be baptised into tlio namo 
Df the Father, the Son, and Holy Ghost, the great covering name provided in 
[hQ Lord Jesus; let him thenceforward wait with thoso "of like precious 
["aith " upon the weekly memorial institution appointed by tho absent master ; 
md let him continue in the daily practice of all tiiincis commanded by Christ, 
md in the daily cultivation of that exalted character whicli was exemplified in 
Z^iYiathim^Gli, waiting and anxioudy dealring the return of the Lord from 
leaven. If he put himaelf into this position, and failhruUy ocinpy it to the 



362 

as "a 



end, he will certainly be approved when the Lord comes, and invited as 
good and faithful servant " to " enter abundantly into Ms kingdom." 

These twelve lectures must now be brought to a close. If they have been in 
any degree instrumental in showing the truth in contrast to prevalent error, 
the mlrit lies not with him who has deUvered them, but with another 
(Dr. John Thomas, of America), who, under God, was the means of opening 
to him the Scriptures, when he feels certain they would otherwise have remainc d 
hermeticaUy sealed, so far as his understanding was concerned. These lectures 
constitute a feeble attempt on his part to render the service to others which has 
been rendered to himself; and if any mind has been exorcised of error,-if 
any taste attracted to the study of the Word of God,-and, above all, any 
judginent matured to the comprehension, belief, and obedience of the truth, the 
effort will have received a perfect recompense in respect of that which shaU I 
have been accompUshed for the ages beyond. The fact is, the only thing 
worth a man's while in this perverted ^tate of existence, is the truth. It makes 
him free for the. present, and safe for the future. AH other hobbies aro 
worthless, compared to it. Time devoted to anything else in preference, is 
wasted. The truth is the only thing that gives a profitable return for labour ; 
it sets a 'man at ease in reference to many questions which perplex the 
unenlightened ; it gives Mm a key for aU the problems of Hf e ; it inspires him 
with confidence amid the uncertainties which distract other mortals ; it guides 
him into a simple, one-hearted, peaceful direction of his affairs; it fiUs his 
mind with comforting assurance concerning the futui-e, iUuminating his prospect 
with a weU-founded expectation of attaining the perfection which the 
yearning heart finds not in all the present; it subdues his propensities, corrects 
moral obliquity, awakes his holiest affections, develops lagging interest, and in 
a word, improves and elevates and sanctifies Ms whole nature, while it givea 
him a guarantee of, and makes him meet for "the inheritance of the saints in 
light." " It hath promise of the Hfe that now is, and also of that which is to 
come." Its pursuit is more worthy than that of any secular object. Labour 
spent in its acquirement, or put forth in its dissemination, wiU develop results 
that wiU gloriously flourish, when the fruits of mere worldly effort wiU have 
perished in irrecoverable oblivion. A hint to the wise is enough. " AU flesh 
is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of gi'ass. The grass 
wivhereth and the flower fadeth away; but the woed of the Lokd endtjeeth 
FOE evee; and this is the word which hy tJie gosj^el is preached unto your^ 
(1 Peter i, 24, 25.) 



363 



A SU M M ARY 

OP THE 

THIKGS SET FORTH IN TEE FOREGOING LECTTIRBS, 

SHEWN IN CONTRAST WITH 

THE TENETS OF ORTHODOX RELIGIOUS BELIEF. 



THE TRUTH. 

1. — The Scriptures are to be read in 
their natural sense, except where 
natural fitness and necessity 
determine a metaphorical or 
symbolical construction. 

2. — The understanding of the Old 
Testament is necessary to 
salvation. 

3. — Manis mortal and made of the dust 
of the ground. The life of man is 
not himself, but the power which 
'enables him (that is, his bodily 
self) to exist in the same way as 
the life of an animal sustains that 
animal in being. It is the ^ery 
same life that is possessed by the 
beasts of the field. 



4. — Man in death, is in a state of 
non-existence for the time being, 
requiring resurrection and judg- 
ment to determine his future 
destiny. 

6.— Immortality is a state of incor- 
ruptible and deathless bodily 
existence, developed by resurrec- 
tion, and attainable only by the 
righteous, at the second appearing 
of Jesus Christ on earth. 






THE APOSTACY. 

1. — The statements of the Bible are 
not to be read literally, but to be 
spiritualised or interpreted in a 
secondary and non-natural sense, 
according to the established rules 
of " divinity." 

2. — The Old Testament is done away 
with by the New, and only use- 
ful to supply texts for sermons. 

3. — Man is immortal and made of 
Spirit from heaven. The life of 
man is his immortal soul, which 
is the seat of his identity and of 
all his mental faculties; this 
inhabiting the body, gives it life, 
and when it leaves the body, the 
body dies, but the immortal 
soul continues to exist in a way 
unkno^\ n in the case of any other 
living thing. 

4. — Man being immortal and indes- 
tructible, the essence of his "soul" 
cannot cease to exist, but passea 
out of *' his body " at death, and 
enters upon a state of happiness 
or woe, according to his deeds. 

5.— Immortality, in the literal sense, 
is the natural attribute of every 
human being, and in the meta- 
phorical sense, it is a state of 
happiness in heaven, to which 
the naturally immortal soul of 
the righteous will ascend after 
death. 



3G4 



THE TEUTH. 

6. — The wicked will for ever be put 
out of existence, by the infliction 
of the "second death" at the 
judgment. 

7. — Judgment to come will be 
dispensed only to the responsible 
classes of mankind, the rest never 
seeing the light of resurrection, 
but perishing for ever like beasts. 



). — At the resurrection, the dead 
** come forth " in unquickened 
natural body, to have it determin- 
ed at the judgment seat, whether 
they are worthy of the gift of 
immortality, or deserving of 
rej ection and re-CGnsignment,after 
punishment, to corruption and 
death. 

I.— God is ONE POWER, the 
Increate Father, by whom all 
things have been created, dwell- 
ing in unapproachable light. 



10. — Jesus Christ, a man begotten of 
the virgin Mary, by the power of 
God through the Spirit, and 
afterwards at his baptism, filled 
with that spirit without measui'e ; 
and therefore called THE SON 
OF GOD ; raised up as a " last 
Adam," to endure the sentence of 
death pronounced upon the first, 
that by subsequent resurrection, 
(possible in his case on account 
of his sinlessness,) he might 
attain immortality for bestowal 
upon all (otherwise excluded) 
who lay hold of him by faith. 



THE APOSTACY. 

6. — The wicked will be tormented by 
the devil to aU eternity in hell, a 
bottomless abyss of fire and brim- 
stone. 

7. — Every human immortal soul will 
be re -united to its body at the 
resurrection, and will appear 
before the judgment seat at the 
" last day," to be judged accord- 
ing to its works, although it has 
been sent to heaven or heU 
beforehand, and although in 
many cases it is in such a state 
of ignorance and debasement as 
not to be held responsible by 
even human law. 

8. — At the resurrection, disembodied 
immortal souls enter incorruptible 
and immortal bodies, before they 
appear at the judgment seat ; and 
if found righteous, they take theii 
immortal bodies to heaven, and if 
wicked, they drag them to hell. 



9. — God is a compound of three co- 
equal, co-eternal elements or 
powers, styled " Father, Son and 
Holy Ghost," existingina stateof 
universal diffusion, without loca- 
tion, and without "body orparts." 

10. — Jesus Christ the eternal Son, a 
part of the eternal God from all 
eternity, who came into a body 
to suffer bodily death for the sins 
of immortal souls, doomed to the 
eternal pains of hell. 



365 



THE TRUTH. 

11. — The Spirit, tlie instrumental 
power of the Father, effluent from 
His person and presence, filling 
universal space, and forming the 
medium of his omnipotent power, 
in inspiration and creation. The 
" Holy Spirit," the same power, 
element, or principle, wielded in 
the hand of direct and specific 
will on the part of the Father. 

12. — Angels, corporeal beings of incor- 
ruptible spirit- substance, employ- 
ed in the accomplishment of the 
divine purposes, and exalted to 
their present position after proba- 
tion. 

13. — The devil, a Bible synonym f6r 
sin — abstract and concrete — 
existing as the spirit of disobe- 
dience in the children of men, 
imd embodied and manifested in 
the persons and institutions of 
the present order of things. 



14.— The kingdom of God, a divine 
political administration of human 
aff'airs, to be established univer- 
sally at the visible advent of 
Christ on earth. 

15.— The promises made to Abraham, 
Isaac, and Jacob, yet to be fulfilled 
in the setting up of the kingdom 
of God on earth, when all nations 
will rejoice in the righteous 
government of the seed of Abra- 
ham, who shall save the children 
of the needy, and break in pieces 
the opx^rossor. 

IG.— Christ, the future destroyer of 
all human governments, and the 
appointed ruler of mankind ; who 
will break llic kingdoms of men 
in pieces, like a potter's vessel, 
and raise tlic standard of univer- 
sal doininiim iu Jerusalem, the 
Holy Cily. 



THE APO STACY. 

11.— The Holy Ghost, one of the 
Trinity, co-equal, co-eternal and 
identical with the Father and 
Son, though why styled the 
*' Holy Ghost," orthodoxy offers 
no answer ; and why sometimes 
Holy Spirit, while in other cases 
simply " Spirit," it is equally 
silent. 

12. — Angels, incorporeal spirits, 
whose function and origin are 
equally incomprehensible. 



13.— The Devil a fallen archangel, 
who notwithstanding his opposi- 
tion to God, is allowed to retain 
possession of supernatural power, 
and permitted to tempt, harass 
and ensnare poor immortal souls, 
whom he is afterwards allowed to 
drag down to his fiery hold, and 
keep in eternal torture. 

14.— The kingdom of God, a state of 
the human " soul," in which tho 
impulses are subjected to tho 
divine supremacy. 

15. — The promises made to theFathcrs 
fulfilled in the preaching of tho 
Gospel in heathen lands, by 
mibsionaries, and at home by 
ministers and clergymen, and 
more particularly in the cxpcrionoo 
of those laying hold of "tho 
consolations of rel igion." 

IG.— Christ, tho spiritual king of his 
own people, reigning in their 
hearts now and for evermore, and 
having nothing furtlier to do 
with Jerusalem, tho Holy Land, 
or the earth, but to consign all 
to the perdition of uniiuenchablo 
fire at the lust day. 



366 



THE TrvUTH. 



17. — The saints— Christ's people — 
the future kings and priests of 
the world, destined to reign with 
Christ over all the earth, admin- 
istering his authority, and 
dispensing blessings to all man- 
kind. 

18. — The covenant made with David 
yet to be realised in the re- 
establishment of the kingdom of 
David in the Holy Land, under 
Christ. 

19. — The second coming of Christ, 
the time when, and the event 
by which, Christ's people will 
receive the promised salvation, 
even the gift of immortality, by 
resurrection, and the glory and 
honour of a throne in the kingdom 
of Christ, then to be established 
over all the earth. 



20. — The restoration of the Jews from 
their present dispersion to their 
own land, a part of the divine 
purpose ; and the enunciation of 
it, an element of the Gospel, as 
part and parcel of "the Gospel 
of the kingdom." 



17.-' 



21.— Christ's oeriing will be prefaced ; 
b^ great wars, and commotions, | 
and distresses, attended by 
terrible judgments, which he will 
directly bring down upon men, | 



THE APOSTACY. 

The doctrine of a "temporal" 
kingdom on earth, a carnal, 
*' damnable doctrine," 



t 



18. — The covenant mr.de with David 

fulfilled in Christ's ascension to 

heaven, where he sits on the 

• throne of David, and rules the 

kingdom of heaven. 

19. — The death of the Christian the 
great epoch of his emancipation 
from this mortal coil, when his 
redeemed soul mounts to mansions 
in the skies, and is received at 
the portals of the celestial city 
with mighty honours of angels, 
and conducted to the throne before 
which he casts his ctowii, and 
joins the ransomed throng in 
praising Him that sitteth thereon, 
and reigneth for ever and ever ; 
though how this comports with 
the resurrection of the body and 
the judgment, orthodoxy never 
cares to explain. 

20. — The Jews are cast off and arc 
greatly deluded in expecting a 
*' temporal Messiah." and as for 
their restoration, (which is an 
entirely doubtful affair,) having 
anything to do with the Gospel, 
the suggestion is monstrous. The 
Gospel consists of the fact that 
Jesus died, and rose again, and 
ascended into heaven. Anything 
beyond this is an addition to 
God's Word, which brings great 
responsibility. 

21.— The Millennium will be brought, 
about by the preaching of the 
Gospel, which will subdue huma n 
propensities, and gradually brin^ 
mankind into a state ofpeac«^ 



307 



THE THUTH. 

to destroy great numbers, and 
discipline the remnant. This is 
necessary, to teach the world 
righteousness, and prepare men 
for the government of the Prince 
ol Peace. 

22.— In the light of Daniel's visions, 
verified by history, and recom- 
mended for enlightenment by 
Christ, it is evident we are near 
the close of the human dispensa- 
tion, and that Christ may be 
expected within the lifetime of 
the present generation. 

23.— In order to be saved, men must 
believe the glad tidings of the 
kingdom of God, set forth in 
the prophets, and preached by 
the apostles ; and must accept 
the doctrine of immortality 
brought to light by Christ in his 
death, resurrection, and ascension. 

24. — Upon believing the Gospel, a 
man must be immericed in water 
for a union with the name of 
Christ, that when Christ comes, 
he may have on the wedding 
garment, w^hich will admit of his 
entrance amongst the wedding 
guests. 

25. — There is no salvation apart from 
a belief and obedience of the 
Gospel. 

26. — Ignorance alienates from eternal 
life. 



THE APOSTACY. 
harmony, and goodwill. Tho 
church will then be triumphant 
on earth. 



22. — The prophets are a sealed book, 
and he who attempts to explain 
them, or to fix a time for the day 
of Christ, is guilty of pre- 
sumption, amounting almost to 
blasphemy. 



23. — It is no consequence wnat a man 
believes, if he be sincere in his 
course of life beforo God, and 
believe that Christ died for sin. 
Points of creed belong to by-gono 
days. 



24. — It is ut+erly a matter of insigni- 
ficance whether a man is baptised 
or not. Christian baptism can bo 
administered by dipping, pouring 
or sprinkling, and is e(jually 
efficacious to babies or grown-up 
persons— the instructed or tho 
ignorant. 

25. — Babies, heathens and idiots will 
be saved. 

26.— A state of total darkness makes 
an immoital soul not responsible, 
and therefore qualified to cnlor 
heaven. 



A FUJF WORDS TO TUE INTERESTED READER, 

There exists a considerable body of persons llirougbout Iniglund and AnicricA, 
holding the views advocated in this book of lectuivs. Thoy are fi)iint>d iuto 
communities styled "ccclcsias," which is tho Gn>('k wrd lransl:.l(>d *' ohurchoH," 
using that word in preference to the other fur the reason that "chuirh" docb not 



368 



express the idea of « ecclesia," eitlier philologically or conventionally. *^ Church,- 
in the abstract, means the portion of a lord, and in current use, denotes a building set 
apart for religious purposes, both of which meanings are totally foreign to the idea 
expressed by "ecclesia." "Ecclesia" means those called out, and for official purposes, 
may be appropriately employed to designate those in their collective capacity, who by 
the truth have been called out both from the world and from the multitude of professed 
Christian bodies, who are built upon the fables of the past instead of the doctrines 
declared by Jesus and the Apostles. It was the name bestowed by the Spirit upon the 
communities holding the truth of Christ in the early centuries ; and as it has no 
proper English equivalent, there is no alternative but to use it in its original form. 
But there is another name by which those holding the faith herein set forth, are 
individually distinguished from the profession of orthodoxy. " Ecclesia " applies . 
only to a number, and answers to ** church" of orthodox usage. The name now 
referred to is of individual application (and at the same time has a generic significance), 
answering to the *' Christian" of common parlance. The believers in Christ were 
called '' Christians," at Antioch, in the first century, and afterwards, everywhere 
else. This was the name by which they were known— the nickname which their 
enemies originated, and which, at that time, was an f^pithet of disgrace, though from 
the disciples' point of view, a name of honour. Why not consent to the same now ? 
it may be asked. For the simple reason that the purpose which the name served in 
ancient times is no longer answered by it; it no longer distinguishes the brethren of 
Christ from those who reject the faith of Christ. Everybody European is called 
"Christian." The word defines nothing beyond an adhesion to the historical 
tradition of Jesus Christ. It imports nothing doctrinal. A man can believe 
anything and be a Christian. For this reason, it has ceased to serve its original use. 
But it may be argued, that the abuse of a right word-a New Testament word— a 
divine designation-does not justify its repudiation on the part of those apprehending 
it truly. The answer to this is : the word is not necessarily a right word, because it 
was invented by the enemies of the truth. The word is not a New Testament word, 
except that the New Testament records that it was used first in Antioch, in reference 
to Christ's brethren, and afterwards employs it only once as a current designation 
(1 Peter iv. 16), and then only in accommodation to popular usage, in the same way 
as Agrippa is recorded to have used it in reference to himself in Acts xxvi. 28. No 
claim can be made for the name on the ground of its divine authority. We must 
deal with it on other grounds. Itwas a name employed for purposes of social distinction. 
It could be employed with no other object. To caU a man a "Christian," did not 
make him a saint ; it only identified him in the popular eye with a sect which, at 
that time, was everywhere spoken against. This use of it is sanctioned by Peter, 
from which it follows that it is scriptural to acknowledge a distinctive designation if 
it accord with the truth. "Christian" accorded with the truth in the days of 
Peter ; it does not do so now, and, therefore, "the case being altered, alters the case." 
What is to be substituted for " Christian ? " Something expressive of the trutb— 



369 

something Scriptural— nothing of human derivation— nothing expressive of human 
affinities. Everything savouring of the Corinthian schisms must be reprobated. Let 
no man say *'I am of Paul," as against another, saying '<! am of Cephas ; " let us all 
say "I am of Christ." But how shall we do this in a name which shall be 
scriptural, and yet distinguish us from the putrid masses of "Christendom," who 
call themselves « Christians ? " The answer is before the reader in the word 

^'CHRISTADELPHIAN,'.' 

This answers all the requirements of the case. It is the Anglicised form of the 
Greek phrase, Christou adelphoi, "brethren of Christ," and is unmistakably 
distinctive, from never having before been employed in the English tongue to 
designate those who are Christ's. It has an advantage over "Christian" in being 
more scriptural and definite in its significance. «* Christian" merely expresses the 
world's dim and unintelligent apprehension of the position of Christ's brethren. The 
world understood not the nature of the relation subsisting between them and Christ, 
It merely saw the former had something to do with the latter, and called them 
Christ-ones ; but " Christadelphians " goes closer, and reveals the fact that the 
disciples of Christ are not merely his servants, but his friends (John xv. 14, 15)— his 
"brethren" (Heb. ii. 11, 17; Matt, xxviii. 10; Rom. viii. 29; John xx. 17)— joint 
heirs with him of the promises made to Abraham." — (Gal. iii. 29 ; Rom. viii. 17.) 

But it may be asked, why not express that fact in plain English, and call them 
** brethren of Christ?" For the simple reason that in plain English, these words 
would be as indistinctive as Christian, since all classes of professors would own to 
''brethren of Christ." No one will acknowledge " Christadelphian " but those who, 
from a knowledge of the truth, realise the necessity of being distinguished from the 
great apostacy in all its sects and denominations. 

If these considerations are not satisfactory to those who object to the Greek form 
of the phrase, and stickle for "Christian," let them remember that "Christian" is 
as much a Greek word as "Christadelphian," and that the choice really lies between 
a Greek appellative, devised by the enemies of the truth in the first century, and one 
expressive of the truth affirmed by the Spirit in the same age of the world. 

The Christadelphians scattered throughout England and America, have no 
ecclesiastical organization beyond the simple arrangements necessary to conduct their 
assemblies as effectively as possible for the objects in view, wbich objects are, 1st — 
their mutual upbuilding in the faith, by observance of the Lord's Supper, "upon the 
first day of the week," (Acts xx. 7; 1 Cor. xvi. 2,) and exhortation; 2nd— the sotting 
forth of the truth for the enlightenment and salvation of the ignorant ; tmd 3rd— a 
mutual care of each other in things spiritual and temporal. They have no " iiiinis- 
ters" or paid officials of any kind, and in the absence of the Spirit, no rulers. OHicial 
brethren are merely servants for the conduct of the necessary business, and attcndanco 
to the general afiairs and interests of the ccclcsia. The brethren, one and all, moot on 
the basis of brotherly love and good sense, aU striving without distinction, to promoto 



370 

the general objects of their union. Any desiring acquaintance with a view to fra« 
ternity on the basis of the truth, can have their wishes gratified, by reference, in 
America, to Doctor Thomas, West Hoboken, Hudson Co., New Jersey; or James 
Donaldson, 242, Jefferson Avenue; Detroit, Mich. ; in Canada, J. Coombe, 104, Yonge 
Street, Toronto; in New Zealand, J. Brown, Greenisland, Otago ; Australia, W. 
Rooke, 51, Gipp Street, Sydney ; and in Britain, to R. Roberts, Athenaeum Room», 
Temple Row, Birmingham ; who will be able to furnish introductions to such friend* 
as are known in these several countries. 

Birmingham, 

July 22nd, 1869. 



69^ 



WiJliam H. Duvie, Primer, 8, Needless Alley, Temple Row, Birmingham. 



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